by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

Astra Space placed satellites into the orbit for the first time on Tuesday, marking a return to flight after a launch failure last month destroyed four CubeSats.

ALAMEDA, Calif. & SEATTLE, March 14, 2022 (Astra Space/Spaceflight Inc. PR) — Astra Space, Inc. (“Astra”) (NASDAQ: ASTR) and Spaceflight Inc. (“Spaceflight”), the leading global launch services provider, today announced a multi-launch contract. The first launch under this contract is planned for today, March 14, 2022, with a window opening at 9:22am PDT / 16:22 UTC out of the Astra Spaceport in Kodiak, Alaska, but may be shifted to March 15, 2022 depending on conditions at the launch site. [Editor’s note: It was delayed a day due to weather.] This agreement provides Spaceflight with launch opportunities using Astra’s launch services through 2025.

Astra Space scrubbed the ninth launch of its Rocket 3.3 booster from the Pacific Spaceport Complex –Alaska on Monday due to bad weather. The company is now targeting Tuesday, March 15 at 9:22 AM PDT (12:22 p.m. EDT) for the Astra-1 mission for Spaceflight Inc. Live stream will begin at T-45 minutes at astra.com/livestream.

SEATTLE, Nov. 9, 2021 (Spaceflight Inc. PR) —Spaceflight Inc., the leading global launch services provider, announced today it will be launching 13 customer payloads, including four microsatellites and nine CubeSats to Sun Synchronous orbit (SSO) aboard the SpaceX Transporter-3 mission, scheduled to launch no earlier than January 2022 from Cape Canaveral. On this mission, which the company has dubbed ‘SXRS-6,’ Spaceflight will deploy customer spacecraft to two distinct orbits for the first time using its chemical propulsion orbital transfer vehicle (OTV), Sherpa-LTC1. Capping a momentous year for Spaceflight, this mission will be the third debut of a new class of Sherpa vehicles within 12 months. 

New OTV missions seed infrastructure for situational awareness, IoT communications and fuel depots throughout LEO, GEO and cislunar

SEATTLE, Sept. 21, 2021 (Spaceflight Inc. PR) — Spaceflight Inc., the global launch services provider, announced it has recently signed several new launch agreements with a wide range of organizations that are expanding space infrastructure. The satellite constellations provide communications networks, device connectivity, weather forecasts, Earth observation, analytics networks, spacecraft collision avoidance, propellant depots, and more. Spaceflight is actively planning several Sherpa orbital transfer vehicle (OTV) missions to support these efforts in low Earth orbit (LEO), Geosynchronous Equatorial orbit (GEO) and other cislunar destinations.

Notably, Spaceflight has signed new launch deals with Astrocast, Canon Electronics, Capella Space, GeoJump, HawkEye 360, Orbit Fab, Loft Orbital, NASA, NearSpace Launch Inc. / Inter-Modal Holding LLC, Portland State Aerospace Society, Space Products and Innovation (SPiN), Spacemanic, University of Toronto Aerospace Team, Xona Space Systems, and several undisclosed U.S. government organizations.