Rocket Lab Snags AuroraSat-1 Launch After Operator Switches Providers

Aurora engineer works on AuroraSat-1 (photo by Aurora)

Rocket Lab will launch AuroraSat-1 for Finland’s Aurora Propulsion Technologies as part of a rideshare mission scheduled for the fourth quarter of this year, the New Zealand launch service provider announced Monday.

Aurora originally scheduled the space junk removal test cubesat to ride on SpaceX‘s Falcon 9 rocket and to be deployed by Momentus‘ Vigoride orbital transfer tug, but switched providers after Momentus pushed back plans for Vigoride’s debut flight to 2022.

Under the terms of its agreement with Rocket Lab, AuroraSat will send the 1.5U cubesat on an Electron rocket carrying other satellites, including including the first ever wooden satellite, WISA Woodsat, developed by Finnish company Arctic Astronautics. The rocket will liftoff from Launch Complex 1 on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula and carry AuroraSat-1 to Low-Earth Orbit (LEO).

Aurora CEO Roope Takala said that the company selected Rocket Lab because of its “rapid and streamlined space access, combined with the ability of Electron’s Kick Stage to precisely deliver payloads to their unique orbits.”

“After earlier launch plans fell through, we greatly value Rocket Lab’s ability to offer a launch in a flight window starting just three months from our originally planned launch date,” Takala said in a statement. “The quick response Rocket Lab offered allows us to space prove our technologies this year and keep on track with our development plans.”

During the demonstration, Aurora will validate the spacecraft’s water-based propellant and mobility control of its “Resistojets,” which are designed to assist cubesats with detumbling capabilities and propulsion-based attitude control. Aurora will also test the satellite’s deployable plasma brakes, which combine a micro-tether with charged particles in space, or ionospheric plasma, to generate significant amounts of drag to deorbit the spacecraft safely at the end of its life.

Rocket Lab said that the AuroraSat-1 launch will follow three back-to-back Electron launches in August and September for BlackSky Global, and the CAPSTONE mission to the Moon in support of NASA’s Artemis program.