Another Commercial Space Success

For John, BLUF:  Private enterprise meeting the Space challenge.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

From The Space Review Jeff Foust tells us about the latest commercial space entry, "Antares rising".  The launch was this last Wednesday.

Orbital Sciences Corporation had a successful launch of its Antares rocket, from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) on Wallops Island, Virginia. Following this successful launch, Orbital will try to fly its Cygnus cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station.

Now attention turns to the next Antares launch this summer to fly the first Cygnus spacecraft. “I’m not going to hold my breath any less on the next one than I did on this one.  Every launch is a challenge,” Culbertson said.  “Rockets are hard.  Spaceflight is difficult.  And getting off the ground is a real challenge.”  It is, though, as Orbital demonstrated Sunday and others have in the past, an achievable challenge.

This brings some competition to the commercial space area.  Late last year Space-X delivered a package to the International Space Station.  The Station Commander, US Navy Captain and NASA Astronaut Sunita Williams referred to it as taming the Dragon as the capsule was hauled in.

Regards  —  Cliff