Rocket Lab Successfully Grabs a Hot Electron Booster Falling From Space With Sikorsky S-92 Helicopter

On Monday, Rocket Lab launched and captured an Electron rocket for the first time with a helicopter.

The liftoff from New Zealand's Mahia Peninsula was put on hold approximately 12 minutes ahead of schedule. Still, they completed it at roughly 6:50 p.m. EDT (10:50 a.m. local time) on Monday.

"Helicopter catch!" Rocket Lab tweeted, "There and back again, " following the successful mission."

Rocket Lab Successfully Caught A Rocket Booster With a Helicopter

For the first time, the 25-year-old space business successfully accomplished a mid-air helicopter grab of a falling rocket booster following a launch in a mission dubbed "There and Back Again."

CNet said the Electron rocket's second stage separated from the first-stage booster around three minutes after launch and continued to push its cargo to orbit. Meanwhile, the first stage began a rapid descent back to Earth.

Mission Control reported that the helicopter pilot had spotted the rocket and parachute 11 minutes into the flight. Then, for four minutes, the Sikorsky's live camera showed nothing but a hanging hook and line, waiting for the rocket and parachute to float into the picture.

CNN added that cheers could be heard on the live stream around 15 minutes after launch. The first-stage rocket, which provides initial thrust but detaches after exhausting its fuel and deploying parachutes on the descent, seemed hooked by the hook-wielding chopper.

The flight launched 34 commercial satellite payloads, increasing the total number of Electron-launched spacecraft in orbit to 146. Since 2018, Rocket Lab has launched 25 times, with three failures.

As the rocket completed its mission and the booster began to swiftly return home through Earth's atmosphere, a Sikorsky S-92, a twin-engine helicopter commonly employed for offshore drilling or search and rescue operations, hovered on standby in a capture zone off the coast of New Zealand.

At around eight miles (13 kilometers) height, the returning rocket released a drogue parachute to begin slowing down, followed by its main parachute at about 3.7 miles (six kilometers) altitude. The stage was slowed from speeds of almost 5,000 miles per hour (8,000 kilometers per hour) to barely 22.3 miles per hour as a result.

The airborne grab was successful, and Rocket Lab halted their commentary for 45 minutes before reporting that the helicopter pilot "noticed different load characteristics" than predicted on the webcast. The payload was "offloaded" by the pilot, which meant the rocket was lowered for a splashdown and retrieval by ship instead.

According to the New Zealand-based business, the Electron booster stage was in "excellent shape" following splashdown, and the pilot detected different load characteristics during unloading than in earlier testing.

The booster will be examined further to see whether it can be launched again.

History of Catching Rocket Boosters

Rocket Lab has seized rocket replicas with a helicopter before, but this is the first time it has attempted to catch a real Electron as it returns to Earth after a mission to orbit.

"Trying to catch a rocket as it falls back to Earth is no easy feat, we're absolutely threading the needle here," said Rocket Lab founder and CEO Peter Beck in a statement.

According to The New York Times, SpaceX has ushered in a new era of reusable rockets, landing and reusing the first stages of its Falcon 9 rockets regularly.

The Falcon 9's second stage (and Rocket Lab's Electron rocket) are still discarded, burning up as they re-enter the atmosphere.

SpaceX's next-generation super rocket, Starship, is being designed to be completely reusable. Rockets that are at least partially reusable are being developed by competitors such as Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance and Chinese businesses.

NASA's space shuttles were somewhat reusable, but they required significant and expensive maintenance after each trip, and they never lived up to their promise of airliner-like performance.

The rocket for the Falcon 9 burns many times after it separates from the second stages, slowing it down on its way to a gentle landing on a floating platform in the water or on land. The Electron is a significantly smaller rocket, making it more difficult to reuse.

Check out more news and information on Rocket Lab in Science Times.