Kacey Roberts
Firefly Aerospace deployed three customer payloads to low Earth orbit early Saturday morning using the company-built Alpha launch vehicle.
The Space Launch Delta 30 unit said Saturday the rocket lifted off at 3:01 a.m. Eastern time from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California as part of Firefly’s small vehicle demonstration effort.
Alpha completed an elliptical transfer orbit, a coast to apogee and a circularization burn during the flight, marking the second orbital launch demo for the Texas-based company.
Col. Robert Long, Space Launch Delta 30 commander, acted as the launch decision authority and cited Firefly’s completed launch demo as “historical.”
The mission involved educational payloads from NASA, Teachers in Space and the Libre Space Foundation.
