This photo provided by Isar Aerospace shows a successfully completed test flight of its orbital launch vehicle called Spectrum from Norway on Sunday, March 30, 2025. (Isar Aerospace via AP)
Republished March 30, 2025 - 7:02 AM
Original Publication Date March 30, 2025 - 5:16 AM
OSLO, Norway (AP) — A private European aerospace startup said Sunday it successfully completed the first test flight of its orbital launch vehicle from Norway.
Isar Aerospace, which is headquartered in Munich, said it launched its Spectrum rocket from the island of Andøya in northern Norway.
The 28-meter (92-foot)-long Spectrum is a two-stage launch vehicle specifically designed to put small and medium satellites into orbit. The rocket lifted off from the pad at 12:30 p.m. (1030 GMT) Sunday and flew for about 30 seconds before the flight was terminated, Isar said.
“This allowed the company to gather a substantial amount of flight data and experience to apply on future missions,” Isar said in a news release. “After the flight was terminated at T+30 seconds, the launch vehicle fell into the sea in a controlled manner.”
The launch was subject to various factors, including weather and safety, and Sunday's liftoff followed a week of poor conditions, including a scrubbed launch on Monday due to unfavorable winds and on Saturday for weather restrictions.
“Our first test flight met all our expectations, achieving a great success,” Daniel Metzler, Isar’s chief executive and co-founder, said in the news release. “We had a clean liftoff, 30 seconds of flight and even got to validate our Flight Termination System.”
The company had largely ruled out the possibility of the rocket reaching orbit on its first complete flight, saying that it would consider a 30-second flight a success. Isar Aerospace aims to collect as much data and experience as possible on the first integrated test of all the systems on its in-house-developed launch vehicle.
Isar Aerospace is separate from the European Space Agency, or ESA, which is funded by its 23 member states.
ESA has been launching rockets and satellites into orbit for years, but mainly from French Guiana — an overseas department of France in South America — and from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
News from © The Associated Press, 2025