Rocket Lab Announced New Hypersonic Testing Program

I happened upon an interesting development while trying to look up information on a recent Rocket Lab mission that I thought must have happened.  The company announced a new program called HASTE (the Hypersonic Accelerator Suborbital Test Electron).  It will provide a suborbital testbed launch vehicle based on Rocket Lab’s well-established Electron rocket. HASTE is intended to provide reliable, high-cadence flight test opportunities needed to advance hypersonic system technology development, with the inaugural launch scheduled to take place in the first half of 2023 for a customer "who shall not be named."  

As that statement leads with, the launch vehicle is essentially their Electron.  It will use the same first and second stages, but it has a modified kick stage that will allow Electron to deploy payloads with a mass of up to 700 kg/1,540 lbs into hypersonic trajectories at five times greater than the speed of sound.  The Electron is limited to putting about half of that, 300 kg, into low Earth orbit; reinforcing that this will be hypersonic, point-to-point tests and not going into orbit. 

Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck, said, 

"We can do lots of interesting things with throttles and shutdowns and really tailor starting points of trajectories super accurately." ... "The whole purpose of this is a high-cadence flight capability. We all know that China and Russia and others have been doing lots of flights and generating lots of data and really advancing the field in hypersonics. The key to advancing the field here in the United States is to do lots of flights."

It appears these flights will be from their facility on Wallops Island, Virginia.  Beck was reluctant to talk about how many missions they intend to launch this year and per year, but since the commonality with the Electron is so high, it's likely that this will help them increase the launch cadence on their only real launch vehicle (for the moment).  Knowledge is likely to flow back and forth between the HASTE flights and orbital flights of the Electron.  The biggest unknown for this application affects the upper kick stage, because traveling at hypersonic speeds in the atmosphere will generate more heat on that upper stage than they see in space.

“Rocket Lab has a strong track record of delivering tailored and reliable space capabilities for the civil space and national security communities across launch and space systems and HASTE is an extension of this,” says Brian Rogers, Senior Director – Global Launch Services. “Hypersonic and suborbital test capabilities are key priorities for the nation, yet the DoD’s ability to test these systems has been limited. With HASTE, we’ve taken a proven vehicle in Electron and tailored it specifically to deliver highly capable, frequent, and cost-effective hypersonic and suborbital test opportunities from our existing launch site in Virginia. Importantly, HASTE is not the promise of a future capability – it's a completed launch vehicle ready for flight now, with the first one currently preparing for launch at our Integration and Control Facility in Wallops, Virginia, in the coming months.”

Rocket Lab USA Image

It's a bit sobering to think that with nine launches last year and a goal of 15 for this year.  Rocket Lab now flies more boosters than any other company in the world besides SpaceX.  (Last year SpaceX launched 61 missions and the goal for this year is 100.)  That obviously makes Rocket Lab one of the most successful launch companies in the world.  Rocket Lab's cadence has surpassed United Launch Alliance, Arianespace, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, and other major players.  They've seen the industry grow bigger and smaller as they've grown.  Vector and Virgin Orbit have both entered bankruptcy, while Astra and Relativity Space have abandoned smaller launch vehicles to pursue the payload class of the Falcon 9.  As Rocket Lab itself has done with their planned Neutron.  

While HASTE is a big win for Rocket Lab, it's also a big test.  Can they manage the launch cadence of HASTE without causing problems for the Electron side?  Can they manage both of those and continue development of Neutron?  Will the end of next year have SpaceX and Rocket Lab on the top of a pile of launch providers or will "The Big 2" thoroughly dominate the industry?  What about the ULA Vulcan and the Blue Origin New Glenn?  Don't run out of popcorn!