D-Orbit, now in orbit, scores a hat-trick

The total weight is just under 1.5 tonnes, which is also a new record.

For the Lombardy-based company D-Orbit, now one of the global leaders in space logistics and orbital transport, the launch that has just taken place marks yet another important milestone in its development.

For the first time, in fact, D-Orbit has carried out three commercial missions using its Ion Satellite Carrier orbital transfer vehicle on a single flight – this time aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 – bringing the total number of such missions carried out since 2020 to 26.

After take-off, the three ‘space ferries’, each of which carried multiple commercial payloads, were deployed into a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of approximately 510 km, with a total payload mass of around 1.5 tonnes, the equivalent of a medium-sized car.

“Our mission control team,” commented Matteo Andreas Lorenzoni, Director of D-Orbit’s Orbital Access Business Unit, “will simultaneously manage three Ion vehicles, each with its own payload and sequence of releases and operational activities in orbit. This is a true test of our operational maturity, for which we have prepared meticulously. The lessons learnt from these missions will be applied directly to future ones, as we continue to expand our orbital transport services.”