Astra Rocket 3

The startup company Astra has manufactured launch vehicles for both commercial and military customers. As of 2021, Astra is attempting to launch a launch vehicle into orbit, but has not been successful. These launch vehicles are labelled “Rocket 3”.

The first two rockets, Rocket 1.0 and Rocket 2.0 were test vehicles without payloads. Although their only launches were reported to be failures, Astra reported they were successful in reaching space on their third Rocket 3 launch but the upper stage did not make orbit due to a wrong fuel and oxidizer mix ratio. The company concluded that this met their goal for the mission and on their next flight will fly a commercial payload. Astra’s next flight on 28 August 2021 with their fourth Rocket 3 vehicle, Rocket 3.3 (LV0006), carrying a payload for the United States Space Force failed to reach space after suffering an engine failure at T+1.

Future rocket variants currently in development include Rocket 4 (an upgraded version of Rocket 3) and Rocket 5 (a suborbital point-to-point delivery variant of Rocket 3).