Conestoga (rocket)

Conestoga (rocket)

The Conestoga was a rocket consisting originally of surplus Minuteman missile stages with additional strap-on boosters, as required, for larger payloads. It was the world's first privately funded commercial rocket, but was used only three times (one as a modified design) before the program was shut down due to a lack of business.

Conestoga was design funded by Space Services Inc. of America (SSIA) of Houston, Texas. They had originally intended to use a design by Gary Hudson, Percheron, which was intended to dramatically lower the price of space launches. Key to the design was a simple pressure-fed kerosene-oxidizer engine that was intended to reduce the costs associated with "throwing away" the booster. Various loads could be accommodated by clustering the basic modules together. SSIA conducted an engine test firing of the Percheron from Matagorda Island on August 5, 1981, but the rocket exploded on the pad due to a malfunction. SSIA then parted ways with Hudson.

SSIA founder David Hannah then hired Deke Slayton, one of the original Mercury Seven astronauts. Slayton had just left NASA after running (among earlier roles) the Space Shuttle Landing and Approach validation testing. They came up with an entire new design based on clustering engines from the second stage of the Minuteman missile. The first launch of the new Conestoga I design took place on 9 Sep 1982, consisting of the core missile stage and a 500 kg dummy payload which included 40 gallons of water. The payload was successfully ejected at 313 km, and the Conestoga I became the first privately funded rocket to reach space.

SSIA launched a second rocket in 1989, turning to commercial support for microgravity experiments, using the Black Brant sounding rocket which they referred to as "Starfire".

SSIA was purchased by EER Systems in December 1990. The design was modified again, this time using the Castor engines originally used on the Scout, a workhorse of the 1960s. The new design was known as the Conestoga 1620, or by other numbers depending on the number and arrangement of the boosters.

In May 1990 the Center for Space Transportation and Applied Research (CSTAR) pitched NASA on their Commercial Experiment Transporter (COMET) payload concept, a low-cost standardized bus with both sub-orbital and orbital components. Rides on the COMET promised to be longer than existing sounding rockets, and the orbital portion would be free-flight and thus not disturbed by crew movement as it was on the Space Shuttle. Westinghouse agreed to provide the bus and "service module", Space Industries Inc. built the re-entry module, and EER was contracted to provide several Conestoga launchers.

The entire COMET program quickly ran into delays and budget overruns, and it was not until the end of the program that a COMET (now known as METEOR) and Conestoga 1620 were finally ready for launch. The satellite payload included a number of experiments, including materials (evaluate exposure to the caustic space environment), biological (assessment of seed reaction in micro-gravity; growth fluids were to be injected to the seed containers after launch), as well as GPS/radar correlation tracking. The satellite included a recoverable section that was to separate on command after several weeks on orbit, fire a small internal retro-motor, and descend for a recovery off the Virginia coast. The launch took place from the a special clamshell gantry, which included power and environmental controls, at the south end of Wallops Flight Facility on 23 October 1995; the rocket launched normally, but broke up in-flight 46 seconds later. EER concluded that an unknown source of low frequency noise caused the guidance system to order course corrections when none were needed, eventually causing the steering mechanism to run out of hydraulic fluid. An earlier NASA review had already decided to refuse further funding due to the original delays, and EER subsequently got out of the rocket business. It was purchased by L-3 Communications in 2001 for $110 million.