Up close and personal with Firefly's Alpha rocket!17 Sept 2022I had the pleasure of speaking to Meagan Roth (Senior Manager of Launch and Test Operations), Shea Ferring (Senior Vice President, Engineering) and Jordi Paredes Garcia (Alpha Chief Engineer) about Firefly's Alpha rocket and their Blue Ghost lunar lander!
Firefly has won the Space Force's Tactically Responsive Space (TacRS-3) launch contract. Honestly, I thought this was basically Rocket Lab's to lose, so I'm curious why they lost it (and why Firefly won it).https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1575979476961280000
Alpha has reached orbit! FLTA002 has gone #ToTheBlack
So somehow no one has actually mentioned it in this thread yet, so:https://twitter.com/Firefly_Space/status/1576106787027099649?s=20&t=NZuNFhg7fnRltGYxTe4fRAQuote Alpha has reached orbit! FLTA002 has gone #ToTheBlackEDIT: Now that they've reached orbit, are we going to get a Firefly section on the forum? I think I'm generally in favor of fewer sections, but Firefly do have quite a few balls in the air (Alpha, Beta, Antares deal, CLIPS/Blue Ghost, Space Utility Vehicle, etc.), so there may be enough to fill out a section.
Quote from: JEF_300 on 10/01/2022 11:04 pmSo somehow no one has actually mentioned it in this thread yet, so:https://twitter.com/Firefly_Space/status/1576106787027099649?s=20&t=NZuNFhg7fnRltGYxTe4fRAQuote Alpha has reached orbit! FLTA002 has gone #ToTheBlackEDIT: Now that they've reached orbit, are we going to get a Firefly section on the forum? I think I'm generally in favor of fewer sections, but Firefly do have quite a few balls in the air (Alpha, Beta, Antares deal, CLIPS/Blue Ghost, Space Utility Vehicle, etc.), so there may be enough to fill out a section.There are feelers with FAI hooking up with NG so I'd wait awhile to see if FAI proves itself to be viable after several flights. Astra in my personal opinion is an example of jumping the gun on new section creation.
Quote from: russianhalo117 on 10/02/2022 12:30 amQuote from: JEF_300 on 10/01/2022 11:04 pmSo somehow no one has actually mentioned it in this thread yet, so:https://twitter.com/Firefly_Space/status/1576106787027099649?s=20&t=NZuNFhg7fnRltGYxTe4fRAQuote Alpha has reached orbit! FLTA002 has gone #ToTheBlackEDIT: Now that they've reached orbit, are we going to get a Firefly section on the forum? I think I'm generally in favor of fewer sections, but Firefly do have quite a few balls in the air (Alpha, Beta, Antares deal, CLIPS/Blue Ghost, Space Utility Vehicle, etc.), so there may be enough to fill out a section.There are feelers with FAI hooking up with NG so I'd wait awhile to see if FAI proves itself to be viable after several flights. Astra in my personal opinion is an example of jumping the gun on new section creation.You say it’s jumping the gun to create a new section for them, yet you do this on the basis of nothing more than speculation about their future relationship with NG. If anything is jumping the gun it seems more the latter than former.
Any LV startup that makes it to orbit should hsve their own section. If nothing else gives us a place to put mission threads. Good chance it will merge with NGIS in future if people's predictions come true. I think future for Firefly is more promising than Astra. For start have lot more capable LV, a depth of engineering talent along with good financial backing.
Blue Origin's had their own section for years and has yet to put anything into orbit. Strange criteria for gatekeeping. They've joined a pretty exclusive group in the industry being only the 5th purely commercial company to put a launch vehicle into orbit, with a few test payloads to boot. There is little that separates them from any of other companies and they have more projects in development than some of those (Astra, Virgin Orbit).
I don't think they plan on doing any of that, but the potential is interesting to me.
Quote from: JEF_300 on 10/02/2022 11:34 pmI don't think they plan on doing any of that, but the potential is interesting to me. Concur.One of my little sadnesses in the history of SpaceX was their abandonment of the Kestrel engine when they discontinued work on Falcon 1e. SpaceX actually had a contract with Orbcomm to launch nominally three of their planned 130kg satellites, for a useful payload to orbit of 390kg. Would that have put Falcon 1e roughly in the same class as FIrefly Alpha? Phrased differently, is Firefly Alpha in some sense Falcon 1e reborn?Regarding your thinking, it seems noteworthy that SpaceX doesn't offer a Kestrel powered third stage for F9 or FH. I believe that's because the performance of MVac is so good that it doesn't make economic sense. I fear the same might be true with your notion of using a Lightning powered stage on top of the Beta MLV, but maybe there are enough differences in the various engine and stage technologies to change that.
I hope Firefly has her own section because is maybe will be an amazing company...
Quote from: Tywin on 10/03/2022 03:13 amI hope Firefly has her own section because is maybe will be an amazing company...It might make sense to combine the NGIS and Firefly sections, since the new Antares will use basically the Beta first stage.
Quote from: Robotbeat on 10/03/2022 03:53 amQuote from: Tywin on 10/03/2022 03:13 amI hope Firefly has her own section because is maybe will be an amazing company...It might make sense to combine the NGIS and Firefly sections, since the new Antares will use basically the Beta first stage.I’d hope if NGIS do buy out Firefly they might keep it as a separate arms length entity rather than just absorbing it into the general NGIS brand.