HELSINKI — Norway inaugurated its northern Andøya spaceport Thursday as commercial launch competition on continental Europe heats up.
Haakon, Crown Prince of Norway, inaugurated the spaceport at a ceremony Nov. 2. The spaceport is located at Nordmela on the Norwegian island of Andøya inside the Arctic Circle and is in the final stages towards operating capability, according to a Nov. 2 press statement.
Andoya Space says the spaceport will become the first operational orbital spaceport in Europe.
The development comes as Europe faces a bottleneck in launch capabilities, with delays to the Ariane 6 and grounding of the Vega C, and a need for strategic autonomy.
The fully constructed spaceport is planned to host several launch pads. German rocket developer Isar Aerospace has exclusive access to the first launch site, which has been built to Isar’s specifications. This infrastructure includes a launch pad, payload integration facilities and a mission control center.
The launch site will support Isar’s two-stage Spectrum launch vehicle, designed to deliver up to 700 kilograms to sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) and up to 1,000 kilograms to low Earth orbit.
The company says it is set to carry out final stage testing of Spectrum. It recently conducted integrated hotfire tests of its Aquila engines for 260 seconds.
“Today, Norway, the Andøya region and Isar Aerospace take a big step towards space,” Daniel Metzler, chief executive and co-founder of Isar Aerospace, said. “Over the last five years, we have built a rocket that will help to solve the most crucial bottleneck in the European space industry – sovereign and competitive access to space.”
“Together with Andøya Spaceport, our team has created an excellent piece of engineering, the first orbital launch site in continental Europe…
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