Rocket Lab’s successful launch of its second rocket from the Mahia Peninsula yesterday marked the "beginning of a new era in commercial access to space".
Rocket Lab founder and chief executive Peter Beck said reaching orbit on a test flight was significant but successfully deploying a customer payload so early in a new rocket programme was almost "unprecedented".
"Rocket Lab was founded on the principle of opening access to space to better understand our planet and improve life on it.
"Today we took a significant step towards that," Mr Beck said.
Following successful first and second-stage burns, the Electron rocket reached orbit and deployed customer payloads at 8 minutes and 31 seconds after lift-off.
In its successful launch yesterday, the company initially said it had reached stage separation, before tweeting the rocket had successfully made it to orbit.
There would be a third test launch — into sun-synchronous orbit of between 300km and 500km above the Earth’s surface — before the company could move into commercial missions. The next launch was expected to take place this year.
"At full production, Rocket Lab expects to launch more than 50 times a year, and is regulated to launch up to 120 times a year, more than any other commercial or government launch provider in history."
Still Testing was carrying a Dove Pioneer earth-imaging satellite for launch customer Planet, as well as two Lemur-2 satellites for weather and ship-tracking company Spire.
A planned launch was scrapped on Saturday less than a minute before scheduled lift-off after a "rogue" boat foiled plans.
"A rogue ship entered our launch-range area, resulting in us having to go into a manually induced hold for the launch."
