Wallops Flight Center, VA -- Off in the southwest, the last colors of sunset lit up the rim of the sky, as a crescent Moon and two planets lined up above. It was a gorgeous scene, but one that everyone was ignoring. Instead, all eyes were focused on a bright patch of artificial light on a barrier island a couple of miles away. The lights there were focused on a small, slender needle—small enough to be hauled to the launch pad by a pickup truck.

For years, the Electron rocket and the company behind it had been stuck in limbo at the Virginia launch site, waiting on various approvals—for regulatory agencies to share enough paperwork with each other to convince everyone that the launch was safe. Then weather and the end-of-year holidays kept pushing the launch back. But on Tuesday, everything went as smoothly as it is possible to imagine, and the Electron shot to orbit almost as soon as the launch window opened. //

bruindrummer Ars Scholae Palatinae
10y

Its low weight also meant Electron left the pad in a hurry. Heavy launch vehicles often seem to hesitate shortly after leaving the pad, leaving my mind struggling to accept that their acceleration is enough to send them off to space. If Electron had an equivalent moment, it was over just as soon as it began.

The speed of a rocket off the pad is a reflection of the thrust to weight ratio (TWR) rather than simply the weight of the vehicle. The Saturn V had a TWR of about 1.2, and it had a nice, leisurely departure from the pad. The Space Shuttle, on the other hand, had a TWR of about 1.5, and it practically jumped from the pad. The Electron has a TWR of about 1.3, so it, too, is rather sporty on liftoff.