SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
SpaceX snags launch contract from Arianespace after Vega rocket fails twice
In a rare victory for international launch competition, SpaceX has snagged a contract to launch an Italian Earth observation satellite from European launch monopoly and political heavyweight Arianespace.
After spending the better part of a decade with its head in the sand as SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket rapidly came to dominate the global launch market, Arianespace has become increasingly reliant on its ability to entice politicians into forcing European Union member states to launch any and all domestic satellites and spacecraft on its Ariane 5, Ariane 6, and Vega rockets. Save for a few halting, lethargic technology development programs that have yet to bear any actionable fruit, the company – heavily subsidized by European governments – has almost completely failed to approach head-on the threat posed by SpaceX by prioritizing the development of rockets that can actually compete with Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy on cost and performance.
[...] A recent development offers the best look yet at what many European space agencies likely suffer through as a consequence of their governments signing away access to an increasingly competitive launch industry – often seemingly in return for Arianespace selecting contractors or (re)locating development hubs or factories in certain countries. Notably, sometime in September 2021, the Italian Space Agency (ASI) confirmed signs that it was moving the launch of its COSMO SkyMed CSG-2 Earth observation satellite from a new Arianespace rocket to SpaceX's Falcon 9.
[...] SkyMed CSG-1 debuted on an Arianespace Soyuz rocket in December 2019, while CSG-2 was originally scheduled to launch sometime in 2021 on one of the first Arianespace Vega-C rockets. However, in July 2019 and November 2020, the Vega rocket Vega-C is based on suffered two launch failures separated by just a single success. Aside from raising major questions about Arianespace's quality assurance, those near-back-to-back failures also delayed Vega's launch manifest by three years. Combined with a plodding launch cadence and jam-packed manifest for Arianespace's other non-Vega rockets, that meant that Italy would have likely had to wait 1-2 years to launch SkyMed CSG-2 on a European rocket.
Previously:
Upper Stage Issue Causes Arianespace Launch Failure, Costing 2 Satellites
Europe Starting to Freak Out About Dominance of SpaceX
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 06 2021, @03:06AM
You do realize that the high payers are getting more than just a rocket launch, don't you?
SpaceX charges $62M for a Falcon 9 launch. They used to charge $50M for a used Falcon 9, but no longer offer that discount. Special payload handling costs extra. Most satellites carry hydrazine and dinitrogen tetraoxide, which are a hazardous materials and typically require payload specific equipment that SpaceX needs to make. That costs extra. Additional prefilght services, such as radio and computer testing, cost extra. Renting a Dragon costs extra. NASA requires a Flight Readiness Report, including a detailed vehicle inspection, engine tear-down and rebuild, and eight meters of documentation [thedailywtf.com]. You bet that costs extra.
The only subsidy SpaceX received for Falcon 9 and Dragon 1 was from the COTS [wikipedia.org] program. NASA more than made that back during CRS1 [wikipedia.org].
SpaceX: $396M COTS + $1.9B for 12 CRS1 flights ($158.3M/flight).
Orbital: $288M COTS + $1.6B for 8 CRS1 flights ($200M/flight).
Had Orbital Sciences been awarded all 20 flights their CRS1 fee would have been (12*$200M)=$2.4B higher. That is ~$100M more than the ~$2.3B SpaceX received in total. SpaceX was also in service two years earlier, meaning NASA didn't need to buy cargo service from foreign providers during those years.