Richard Branson's Virgin Orbit to launch seven satellites from its Boeing 747 aircraft on Thursday

Amid growing competition from SpaceX and Blue Origin, Virgin Orbit is looking for a piece of the pie as it prepares to demonstrate its air flexibility by launching small satellites to space. The company will launch payloads designed by the US Department of Defense, Spiral Global and Sat Revolution from its aircraft dubbed Cosmic Girl.

The LauncherOne mission called "Above the clouds" is scheduled to launch on January 13 after a day-long delay as the team takes little extra time to thoroughly validate the system and to check the sensor readings. The launch is likely in the window between 1:00-3:30 pm Pacific on Thursday.

"The launch system, the team, and our customers' satellites remain in excellent shape as we prepare for the start of our latest mission," Virgin Orbit said in a tweet.

The aircraft will launch from the Mojave Air and Space Port taking seven customer satellites to their orbit nearly 500 kilometres above the planet. While four of the satellites belong to the US Department of Defence, two smallsats are from Polish developers and one from Spire.

© Provided by India Today

Virgin Orbit uses a Boeing 747 aircraft as a launch platform. (Photo: Virgin Orbit)

The Richard Branson founded company's technology to launch satellites is different from traditional ones where they are placed atop a rocket and blasted off into space. Virgin Orbit instead uses a Boeing 747 aircraft as a launch platform, which can take off from several airstrips and does not require a behemoth rocket and a dedicated launch pad.

The aircraft, once into the air, travels anywhere between 30 minutes and four hours before reaching the deployment zone with the rocket carrying smallsats tethered to it. At a cruising altitude of 35,000 feet, the rocket is released. After a 4-second freefall, the first stage engine, NewtonThree, bursts to life, accelerating the rocket to more than 8,000 miles per hour. Once its fuel is spent, the first stage detaches.

Before detaching, the first stage engines would push the payload 310 to 745 miles above the Earth's surface, when NewtonFour kicks off a series of burns to circularise its orbit. The fairing pops open, exposing the payload as it nears its destination.

© Provided by India Today

The LauncherOne mission called "Above the clouds" is scheduled to launch on January 13. (Photo: Virgin Orbit)

The January 13 launch is the first of six such launches planned by Virgin Orbit in 2022. Virgin Orbit sent its first batch of satellites into orbit in January last year; the 10 Nasa-sponsored satellites were designed and built by universities. A flight demo last year was unsuccessful.

Virgin Orbit said its air-launched system can put satellites into orbit on relatively short notice, compared with the more traditional way of launching rockets from the ground.

Watch Live TV in English

Watch Live TV in Hindi