Firefly Aerospace’s Fascinating Plans For The Future
You may be aware of Firefly Aerospace and its work on the Alpha launch vehicle. This is a small-lift launch vehicle that is making great progress towards efficient and cost-effective launches. However, you may not know about some of the private companies’ crazy ideas for the future. All of which are extremely ambitious and quite unique.
Some of Firefly Aerospace’s future plans include a larger rocket, lunar lander, space utility vehicle, and Gamma. Projects such as Gamma stand out thanks to the design along with the goal to be highly reusable, not a rocket but a rocket plane, and have the potential for hypersonic transport to Earth.
Firefly Aerospace even makes sure to point out the difference between projects like Gamma from other companies such as SpaceX and Blue Origin. The small private company has very big plans for the future involving small lift launch vehicles and much more. Their ambition and dedication will likely cause the company to have a very big impact on the future space industry and possibly the world.
Firefly Aerospace Background
Firefly Aerospace is an American private space company with the goal of increasing access to space. It’s based out of Austin Texas and produces different launch vehicles. Currently, the company is farthest along with its Alpha rocket. This is a small-lift launch vehicle aiming to lower the cost per launch. Specifically Alpha is 29m tall and around 1.8m wide with the exception of the fairing at 2m wide. This rocket also has a payload to low Earth orbit of 1000kg. The company is small in size but is making a lot of progress in a short period of time.
The company was formed in 2017 when the assets of the former company Firefly Space Systems were acquired by EOS Launcher. Since then they have been hard at work developing new and ambitious technology to try and increase access to space. The founder and chief executive officer Thomas Markusic also has an interesting background. Prior to co-founding Firefly Aerospace, he worked all around the space industry at different large companies and agencies. Some of the places he worked include Virgin Galactic, Blue Origin, SpaceX, and was even a civil servant at NASA and the USAF. All of this experience combined with a great team is the reason Firefly Aerospace is making such big strides in the space industry. The market for small-lift launch vehicles is huge and the private company has plans to become a major player in that space.
Ambitious Plans For The Future
As I mentioned before Firefly Aerospace is a smaller company currently primarily working on a small-lift launch vehicle Alpha. However, the company is also planning some incredibly unique and ambitious tech for the future that if successful could have a very big impact on the space industry. Here I will go more in-depth into some of the companies plans.
Lunar Lander – The first piece of technology I want to focus on is Firefly Aerospace’s lunar lander. The company named the lander Blue Ghost and it’s meant to be landing on the Moon as soon as mid-2023. The lunar lander leans towards the smaller side with a payload capacity of 50kg. This lander was selected by NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Service program to deliver a suite of 10 payloads to the lunar surface by 2023. Firefly Aerospace received a reward price of $93.3 million that is going towards the development of Blue Ghost.
The payloads on the surface will operate using lunar-lander provided data and power resources. While Firefly Aerospace was funded for this commercial mission with NASA, they have additional plans for the future. Once the initial mission is completed the private company wants to use Blue Ghost for future commercial missions to the Moon selling payload capacity. This could provide a unique service to send different technology and items to the Moon from a private company.
Beta – As the name suggests Beta is the step up to the Alpha launch vehicle. Beta is a medium-lift launch vehicle meant to be capable of carrying significantly more cargo into orbit and beyond than Alpha. Both rockets have practically the same design with some differences in size. Beta comes in at 46.7m tall and has a core stage width of 3.7m with a fairing diameter of 4.7m. This extra size and power provide a lot more opportunities for the company. The payload to low Earth orbit is increased to 8,000kg allowing very large satellites and other cargo to be launched. The rocket is also capable of reaching Geosynchronous Transfer Orbits. Additionally, Firefly Aerospace is confident that its Beta launch vehicle will have the lowest cost per launch out of all rockets in the 8,000kg and under class.
Gamma – The previous projects I mentioned are innovative and exciting but none of them compare to Gamma. Gamma is a rocket plane meant to change how we access space. Starting with the rocket plane aspect, Gamma is planning to infuse modern aerospace technologies in a reusable vehicle. It will utilize Alpha and Beta-derived technologies to reduce cost, schedule, and risk. The rocket plane will have an optional air launch or ground launch configuration. Meant to bring order of magnitude launch cost reductions to the industry.
Firefly Aerospace even mentions the launch vehicle could be used for potential hypersonic transportation on Earth. The rocket plane is meant to be highly reusable saving money and time. The rocket plane has two main stages. The first stage has two aerospike engines along with a cross-fed second stage engine. Towards the center of the rocket plane, it houses the cargo meant to carry around 5,000kg. All of these components are covered with a sleek plane design full of heat shielding and more advanced technology. It’s not clear any dates related to Gamma but the rocket plane is very exciting to look at.
Space Utility Vehicle – Finally Firefly Aerospace showcases its Space Utility Vehicle. This piece of technology uses solar electric propulsion to take payloads to orbits that a small launch vehicle could never access before. This technology essentially adds additional power and after the initial launch vehicle has done the majority of the work, it powers up and puts the payload even further out than thought possible. Firefly Aerospace points out that by means of the in-space propulsive third stage, uplink or downlink services, and up to 2 kW of solar power, SUV is capable of satisfying a wide variety of mission architectures that last up to 5 years. This piece of technology is very innovative and could increase the private companies’ launch capabilities in a short period of time. It would also save different customers money when purchasing a spot on Alpha. Rather than having to buy a spot on Beta, they could get to the desired orbit on the small-lift launch vehicle thanks to the Space Utility Vehicle.
Conclusion
Firefly Aerospace is planning some amazing things for the future. The company has already made impressive feats in a short period of time with its Alpha launch vehicle. They plan to do even more as time goes on. Some of the impressive goals of the private company include a lunar lander, Beta, Gamma, and a Space Utility Vehicle. All of which are extremely innovative and could have a big impact on the future space industry. Unique and outside the box ideas like these are exactly what the industry needs. When companies take risks and do something different this is when the most innovation happens. As more parts of the industry are innovated the better access to space we get. Firefly Aerospace is a very exciting company to watch. We will have to wait and see what the company ends up doing and its future work on these different ambitious projects.