Virgin Orbit’s ambitious mission, “Start Me Up,” aimed at achieving the first-ever orbital launch from the UK, faced a setback as its LauncherOne rocket experienced an anomaly, resulting in the loss of the craft and its payload. The mission, heralded as a new era for British space travel, came tantalizingly close to success but fell short by just one phase of engine burn. The Director of Systems Engineering and Verification at Virgin Orbit, Chris Relf, announced the anomaly around 24 minutes after the launch, leaving the team to analyze flight data to determine the cause. Despite the disappointment, UK Space Agency officials express commitment to future launches, emphasizing the success of establishing horizontal launch capability at Spaceport Cornwall.

https://www.npr.org/2023/01/10/1148106922/uk-space-launch-failure-virgin-orbit-launcherone

Photo by Ed Dunens, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en