spacetoday.net: Vega C returns to flight with Sentinel-1C launch

Posted: Sat, Dec 7, 2024, 10:12 AM ET (1512 GMT)
Vega C return to flight, December 2024 (ESA)

Europe's Vega C rocket successfully returned to flight Thursday, nearly two years after a launch failure. The Vega C lifted off from French Guiana at 4:20 p.m. Eastern and deployed the Sentinel-1C Earth observation satellite about an hour and 45 minutes later. The launch was the first for the Vega C since a December 2022 failure blamed on the nozzle of the second-stage solid-fuel motor. That motor was redesigned and tested on the ground twice before this launch. The launch helps bring to an end the "launcher crisis" in Europe that had forced ESA and the European Commission to go overseas to launch science and navigation satellites. Sentinel-1C, a radar mapping satellite that is part of the Copernicus program, replaces the Sentinel-1B satellite that failed nearly three years ago.