Astra Continues To Make Progress Towards The Next Mission
Astra Space is one of many companies that have been very exciting to keep up with as they progress. With ambitious plans for the future and some recent promising results, the company continues to work towards the next mission and more. However, this process involves a lot of challenges, and nothing is guaranteed in such a competitive and challenging market.
Right now Astra is getting ready to launch once again for NASA Tropics 1. This mission will provide rapid-refresh microwave measurements over the tropics that can be used to observe and learn more about the storm lifecycle. This comes in addition to Astra’s continued updates on its plans for the future and how they plan to achieve them.
Reaching orbit is an immensely difficult task that rocket companies within the industry face. Astra recently reached this milestone for the first time and has no plans of slowing down. This being said, each launch still presents a lot of challenges and often firsts. Here I will go more in-depth into the upcoming mission with NASA, Astra’s plans and ideas for the future of the company, and what to expect in the coming weeks.
Upcoming Launch
Over the past few months, Astra has been staying busy in many ways. This includes continuing to launch as they grow the company and its reliability. In the weeks prior, Astra has provided updates on the next launch and what to expect. This began on May 30th when they tweeted saying, “LV0010 has arrived at Space Launch Complex 46 (SLC-46) in Cape Canaveral. Thank you to the team at @SLDelta45 for their partnership. Learn more about our upcoming TROPICS mission with @NASA.” This tweet included a short video highlighting this transportation process. Only a few days after this Astra conducted a static fire of the launch vehicle in preparation for the mission. Yesterday they tweeted mentioning, “Successful static fire for @NASA TROPICS-1!” Lastly, only hours ago, NASA tweeted in response to this update highlighting, “@Astra conducted a static fire test for the first of three TROPICS launches. The TROPICS mission is a constellation of SmallSats that will help scientists understand tropical cyclones. Astra is part of NASA’s Venture Class Launch Services Demonstration 2!”
More specifically, the Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation structure and storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats (TROPICS) mission will provide rapid-refresh microwave measurements over the tropics that can be used to observe the thermodynamics of the troposphere and precipitation structure for storm systems at the mesoscale and synoptic scale over the entire storm lifecycle. TROPICS comprises a constellation of CubeSats in three low-Earth orbital planes. Each CubeSat will host a high-performance radiometer scanning across the satellite track at 30 RPM to provide temperature profiles using seven channels near the 118.75 GHz oxygen absorption line, water vapor profiles using 3 channels near the 183 GHz water vapor absorption line, imagery in a single channel near 90 GHz for precipitation measurements, and a single channel at 205 GHz for cloud ice measurements. This observing system offers an unprecedented combination of horizontal and temporal resolution to measure environmental and inner-core conditions for tropical cyclones (TCs) on a nearly global scale and is a profound leap forward in the temporal resolution of several key parameters needed for detailed study of high-impact meteorological events (TCs being the primary emphasis in this proposal). TROPICS will demonstrate that a constellation approach to Earth science can provide improved resolution, configurable coverage (tropics, near global, or global), flexibility, reliability, and launch access at extremely low cost, thereby serving as a model for future missions. This upcoming launch will take the first of three satellites into orbit.
In the past, Astra has gone into depth on how exactly launch dates are formed and how you can get an idea of the process the company uses. It begins with Licensing. This occurs when Astra’s multiple regulators—the FAA, FCC, Air Traffic Control, and Coast Guard—have approved all required licenses and notifications, all of which are required for public safety. The detailed analysis of their trajectory and the radio frequencies they use help to ensure that the rocket does not create a hazard for people who may be near the launch site, and further afield in the path Astra’s vehicle takes to orbit. These include notifications to pilots (NOTAM), notifications to sea vessels (NOTMAR), and receipt of both the spaceport/range approval and the launch license. Filing for a license to launch is not a guarantee that a launch will occur. In terms of this specific launch, towards early May Astra provided an update and mentioned its license with the FAA will cover all three of the TROPICS launches.
The next step has to do with the customer. This occurs when the customer has prepared its payload for integration into Astra’s launch vehicle. Payload readiness includes ensuring that the payload can travel to the payload integration location, that the environment at this location can be controlled, and that the payload can connect and “speak” to the rocket. Next is range, this occurs when the range/launch site approves Astra’s launch date(s). This approval is contingent on range logistics and capacity, and avoiding conflict with other customers’ schedules. Requesting a launch date is not a guarantee, and those dates they request are often shifted as the range goes through their own deconfliction process. For weather, Astra closely monitors weather reports at the range and or launch site, and have to remain flexible if there are forecasted weather events that could be unfavorable to launch, such as heavy wind and lightning. If the process of range deconfliction, customer readiness, or licensing causes the projected launch date to change into another month, it impacts the licensing analysis, causing additional licensing work. Bringing together the Astra Launch System, including a completed rocket, launcher system and running through the built-in tests and procedures to make sure every component is ready for launch is critical to the success of every mission. Astra is confident its mobile-first launch system allows for more flexibility than systems that use fixed infrastructure at the launch site. The agility built into the system allows the company to flex its scheduling to align with the other partners in this process. As of right now, Astra is getting close to this launch and dates will likely be determined very soon.
Astra’s Plan
In addition to continuing to launch and improve the company’s launch service, Astra also has big plans for the future. They recently held a Spacetech day where they highlighted progress, improvements, and important goals. More specifically, on May 12th, 2022, Astra hosted the inaugural Spacetech Day at its headquarters and factory in Alameda, California to outline its mission, vision, and strategy. With the overall goal to improve life on earth from space, Astra announced three phases of its long term strategy.
In Phase 1, they are focused on dramatically increasing access to space by scaling their launch services business as quickly as possible. To get to space more economically, you can either scale up your rocket or scale out your factory to make many smaller rockets—they have chosen to scale out their factory and automate as much as they can so they can make more rockets more quickly with less people. As part of this, Astra unveiled the next phase of its launch services roadmap, Launch System 2.0. The design goals for Launch System 2.0 focus primarily on three areas: cadence capacity, and cost. In Phase 2, Astra plans to develop or license required core space technologies that will be productized and incorporated into newer rockets, satellites, and other infrastructure, that will be used to deliver space services. The acquisition of Apollo Fusion last summer is one example of Astra acquiring and productizing a core space technology. In Phase 3 which they expect by 2023, they plan to vertically integrate Astra’s core technologies into an Astra constellation, which will be optimally launched and maintained by the Astra launch system allowing them to power the space economy. Lastly, Astra’s Launch System 2.0 will focus on improving cadence, capacity, and cost, while increasing automation. The design point is 300 kilograms of payload to low Earth orbit using a slightly larger rocket with more powerful engines. While Astra continues to focus on capacity, they are continuing to drive costs down. They predict the base launch price will be $3.95 million.
Conclusion
Astra has been an exciting company to watch in recent years. After multiple failed attempts, not long ago the company reached an impressive milestone when it delivered a payload to orbit for the first time. Now, Astra is speeding up its launch process and working on ambitious plans for the future. This includes the upcoming TROPICS mission, a new launch system, and a three-phase approach meant to change how they access space. We will have to wait and see how it progresses and the impact it has on the space industry.
