by The second mission of Europe’s new Vega-C rocket did not go according to plan.
The medium-lift Vega C took off from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on Tuesday (December 20) at 8:47 p.m. EST (10:47 p.m. local time; 0147 GMT on December 21), carrying two satellites for Airbus’ Pléiades Neo Earth imaging constellation.
The rocket’s first stage, known as the P120C, did its job. But the second stage, dubbed the Zefiro 40, didn’t.
“About 2 minutes and 27 seconds after launch, an anomaly occurred on the Zefiro 40, ending the Vega C mission,” officials from Arianespace, the French company operating the Vega C, said in an email sent statement on Tuesday evening. “Data analysis is underway to determine the reasons for this failure.”
Related: The History of Rockets
The Vega C was developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) and is operated by Arianespace.
The 35-metre-high, four-stage rocket is a more powerful version of the Vega, which first flew in 2012. The Vega C can carry around 2,300 kilograms of payload over a 435-mile route. high (700 kilometers) sun-synchronous orbit, compared to 3,300 pounds (1,500 kg) for the older rocket, according to Arianespace (opens in new tab).
The two spacecraft lost in Tuesday’s failure, Pléiades Neo 5 and Pléiades Neo 6, together weighed 1,977 kg. The duo were en route to sun-synchronous orbit where they would have completed Airbus’ Pléiades Neo-Earth constellation.
“Composed of four identical satellites, built using the latest Airbus innovations and technological developments, the constellation will allow any point on Earth to be imaged several times a day at a distance of 30 centimetres [12 inches] Resolution,” Arianespace wrote in a mission briefing for the Vega C (opens in new tab).
“They are extremely agile and reactive and can be commissioned up to 15 minutes before acquisition and send the images back to Earth within the hour that follows,” added Arianespace. “Smaller, lighter, more agile, more precise and more responsive than the competition, they are the first in their class whose capacity will be fully commercially available.”
The Vega C had a flight before Tuesday. In July 2022, the rocket successfully launched LARES-2, a 650-pound (295 kg) satellite developed by the Italian Space Agency, and six ride-on CubeSats.
Tuesday’s mission was originally scheduled to start on November 24th. But Arianespace delayed them by almost a month to replace faulty equipment on the rocket, a process that was required Opening the Vega C payload fairing (opens in new tab) at a processing plant in Kourou.
Further analysis will likely attempt to determine if the faulty equipment had anything to do with the launch failure. We should hear more on Wednesday (Dec 21); Arianespace plans to hold a media teleconference at 10:00 am EST (1500 GMT).
Mike Wall is the author of “Out there (opens in new tab)(Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a book about the search for extraterrestrial life. Follow him on Twitter @michaelwall (opens in new tab). Follow us on Twitter @spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or on Facebook (opens in new tab).
