I mean, the turnaround days so far, assuming 4 Nov and 31 Dec for the next two: 240, 160, 83, 57. It’s pretty reasonable to not ramp up enough to squeeze in a 5th launch this year.
Next year has 10 launches on Wikipedia (only counting 1x Kuiper), so they’ll be busy. The Ariane record was 12 a few times around 2000, but I bet that’ll stand for at least 1 more year.
If that’s launching on a Vega-C first stage then the payload must be tiny. Using a disposable 1st stage also feels like it defeats the purpose a bit. It’s cool that they’re at least studying the concept, though.
To date, Isar Aerospace, Rocket Factory Augsburg, Latitude, and PLD Space have all signed an initial feasibility agreement
I haven’t followed Latitude, but they’ve said they want to launch from this facility in 2026. PLD said the same thing, but they’re already working down there and the article said it’ll still be tight. So Latitude probably won’t launch until 2027?
Isar has Andoya and RFA has Saxavord, so they probably aren’t as worried about it.
I think it’s still technically a small-lift launcher, but 1000kg is a good step up from the really small ones around 100-250 kg, and would potentially let it steal some Vega launches.
I’m glad that a bunch of startups made the cut. It makes sense that Maiaspace got in, as an arm of Ariane, but they’re probably less strapped for cash. And thank goodness at least two have reusable concepts, PLD and Maia.
Europe calls on them to have rockets available to launch.
Complaining that SpaceX stole their lunch is a bit of an own goal when Ariane 6 was so delayed, Vega scrapped some tanks they needed, and Vega C was grounded for 2 years.
I think the reddit streams pages (RIP /r/nbastreams, /r/soccerstreams, etc) were the peak of stream accessibility and quality for me. I have some go-to sites now, but those subreddits were so convenient and easy.