Avio, when will Vega C fly again
Investigation into Vega-C Z40 engine test anomaly completed following the failure of Vega C's first commercial flight on December 20. ESA postpones Vega C's return to flight to the end of 2024: a nozzle of the rocket engine needs to be redesigned. In the meantime, Vega is preparing for the flight on October 6th.
Vega-C, the updated version of the European Vega launcher made by Avio in the Italian Colleferro factories, will fly again at the end of 2024.
The Independent Investigation Commission (IEC) established by the European Space Agency (ESA) to examine the anomaly that occurred during the test of Vega-C's Zefiro 40 engine on June 28, recently completed its work.
The launcher was left stuck on the launch pad following the failure of Vega C's first commercial flight on December 20th. The failure dealt a major blow to European efforts to maintain launch autonomy . The Vega C was one of the cornerstones of that strategy, together with the Ariane 6 still awaiting its debut date.
Therefore, ESA considers the return to flight of Vega-C "a strategic priority to guarantee Europe's independent access to space", but following the new investigation it concluded that it is necessary to redesign a nozzle of the rocket engine.
During the first six months of the year, Arianespace launched a single Ariane 5 launcher on behalf of ESA last July, while the American SpaceX carried out 43 Falcon 9 launches – or almost two per week – and the Chinese Casc 18 , notes La Tribune .
Meanwhile, the Italian aerospace group announced the launch of two more Vega rockets, which do not use the Zefiro 40 engine, with the first flight scheduled for October 6 from the Guiana Space Center and the second expected in the second quarter of next year.
All the details.
WHAT THE COMMISSION OF INQUIRY CONCLUDED
The Commission concluded that in the current nozzle design, the combination of the geometry of the throat insert and the different thermomechanical properties of the new Carbon-Carbon material used for this test caused progressive damage to other parts adjacent to the nozzle and a progressive degradation which led to the nozzle anomaly. This phenomenon is not related to those observed on the VV22 mission with the previous Carbon-Carbon material. A task force led by ESA and Avio has been established which will immediately begin to implement the recommendations proposed by the IEC. ESA will support this program, drawing on resources already available.
EXTRA COSTS
According to ESA's director of space transport, Toni Tolker-Nielsen, the additional cost linked to putting Vega-C back into flight should amount to between 25 and 30 million euros, included in the ESA funding voted by the States last year members, La Tribune reports.
WHEN WILL VEGA C FLY
So Vega-C will fly again in the fourth quarter of 2024. ESA initially hoped to resume Vega C flights by the end of 2023. “We plan to ground test as much as possible before the flight to make sure we have done a good job in adapting the project”, declared Avio CEO Giulio Ranzo. ( Here for Startmag 's in-depth analysis on Why the Democratic Party sends a torpedo to Avio and Ranzo).
VEGA'S NEXT FLIGHT
As announced by Arianespace, the next Vega VV23 flight is scheduled from the French Guiana Space Center for October 6 at 10.36pm local time. The mission will place two main satellites plus ten auxiliary satellites in sun-synchronous orbit. The main satellite Theos-2 (Thailand Earth Observation System 2) for Earth observation to support the main development priorities of the Kingdom of Thailand, has a ground image resolution of 0.5 meters. The second Formosat-7R/Triton satellite, developed by the Taiwan Space Agency (Tasa), is equipped with a global navigation satellite reflectometry system to study ocean winds and provide data to predict the intensity and trajectory of typhoons.
Vega's second and final launch is scheduled for the second quarter of 2024. Arianespace CEO Stéphane Israël said the payload for that mission, along with Vega C's return to flight, have yet to be identified. Arianespace plans to make four Vega C flights in 2025 and subsequent years, with the possibility of increasing the launch rate to five or six per year.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/avio-quando-tornera-a-volare-vega-c/ on Wed, 04 Oct 2023 05:54:50 +0000.