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USAthanks to SpaceXonce again crushed the global market for space launchers, carrying out 107 orbital flights in 2023, far ahead of other countries in this strategic sector.
SpaceX, Elon Musk’s company, launched its Falcon 9 96 times throughout the year, reaching a rate of almost two launches per week, with the aim of continuing the deployment of its Starlink constellation of internet satellites.
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Space This launcher will be used for the Artemis missions to the Moon.
“Next year, we want to increase the number of flights to about 12 flights a month, that is, 144 flights,” SpaceX Vice President Bill Gerstenmaier said when appearing before the US Senate in October.
Faced with American dominance, China is rapidly expanding its space activities. It made 67 launches in 2023, up from 64 in 2022, according to Spacenews. Of them, 47 were from its Long March rocket alone, according to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC).
Russia made 19 launches, 17 of them of the Soyuz rocket, mainly transporting satellites for its government and military needs, as well as Progress spacecraft, bound for the International Space Station (ISS), according to the specialized website Gunter’s Space Page.
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The Electron rocket of the American and New Zealand company Rocket Lab, one of the few operational mini-launchers, was fired nine times.
India, with space agency Isro, launched its GSLV, PSLV and SSLV rockets seven times in 2023.
Isro also carried out the first launch of 2024: a PSLV rocket, fired at 0430 GMT on Monday, sent a scientific satellite into orbit.
Europe, in a current launcher crisis, only carried out three launches in 2023: the last two Ariane 5 and a Vega rocket. But it hopes to regain autonomous access to space with the inaugural flight of Ariane 6, scheduled for mid-June, and with the flight of Vega-C at the end of the year.
Japan also conducted three launches in 2023, but its new H-3 heavy launcher failed. The Japanese space agency, Jaxa, announced that it will make a new attempt on February 15.
Source: Elcomercio
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