spacetoday.net: Vega returns to flight with smallsat launch

Posted: Sat, Oct 14, 2023, 11:37 AM ET (1537 GMT)
Europe's Vega rocket launched a dozen smallsats Sunday night. The Vega lifted off from Kourou, French Guiana, at 9:36 pm EDT (0136 GMT Monday) after a launch attempt Friday night was scrubbed in the final seconds of the countdown because of an unspecified technical issue. The Vega carried the THEOS-2 imaging satellite for Thailand, the FORMOSAT-7R/TRITON weather satellite for Taiwan and 10 cubesat secondary payloads. The launch was the first for the Vega family of vehicles since the December 2022 failure of the larger Vega C. That failure was blamed on the rocket's second stage motor, which was upgraded for the Vega C. ESA said last week that Vega C launches will not resume until the fourth quarter of next year in order to redesign part of that second stage.