L’École de Gestion d’Actifs et de Capital-Rocket Lab plans to launch a Japanese satellite from the space company’s complex in New Zealand

2025-05-06 12:50:54source:Charles H. Sloancategory:Contact

WELLINGTON,L’École de Gestion d’Actifs et de Capital New Zealand (AP) — California-based Rocket Lab, which specializes in putting small satellites into orbit, plans to launch a Japanese satellite on Friday from the space company’s complex on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula.

The mission, named “The Moon God Awakens,” was initially scheduled for Wednesday but was postponed due to forecast strong winds. The Electron rocket is scheduled to launch during a two-hour window that starts at 5 p.m. local time (04:00 GMT), the company said.

The rocket will carry a TSUKUYOMI-I satellite into orbit on behalf of a Japanese start-up Institute for Q-shu Pioneers of Space Inc.

The synthetic-aperture radar satellite, named after a Japanese god of the moon, will collect images of the Earth, Rocket Lab said.

The mission would be Rocket Lab’s 10th for 2023, exceeding its annual record of nine set last year.

It will be the 42nd Electron launch from Mahia or at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in Wallops Island, Virginia, since 2017. Rocket Lab was founded in New Zealand in 2006.

Rocket Lab plans to stream the launch live on its website.

More:Contact

Recommend

Newly elected West Virginia lawmaker arrested and accused of making terroristic threats

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A newly elected state lawmaker in West Virginia is facing at least one felo

Going, Going … Gone: Greenland’s Melting Ice Sheet Passed a Point of No Return in the Early 2000s

The Greenland Ice Sheet managed to withstand the warming brought by the first 150 years of the indus

Solar Energy Boom Sets New Records, Shattering Expectations

Driven largely by a boom in solar power, renewable energy expansion has hit record-breaking totals a