Rocket Lab launches private Japanese 'Strix' satellite

(Image credit: Rocket Lab)

Rocket Lab launched an Earth-observing radar satellite for the Japanese company Synspective on Friday (March 20).

An Electron rocket topped with one of Synspective's Strix satellites lifted off from Rocket Lab's New Zealand site on Friday at 2:10 p.m. EDT (1810 GMT; 7:10 a.m. on March 21 local New Zealand time), on a mission called "Eight Days a Week."

Friday's launch is the eighth that Rocket Lab has conducted for Synspective, which helps explain the mission name.

The Tokyo-based company is building "a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging constellation over Japan that provides data for urban development planning, construction and infrastructure monitoring and disaster response," Rocket Lab wrote in a mission description.

Rocket Lab has been the sole launch provider to date for the Strix constellation, whose first satellite went up in 2020. ("Strix," in case you were wondering, is a widespread genus of owls.) Synspective has booked another 20 Electron launches, including "Eight Days a Week," to finishing assembling the constellation by 2029, according to Rocket Lab.

"Eight Days a Week" is the 77th launch to date for the 59-foot-tall (18-meter-tall) Electron, which debuted with a test flight in May 2017.

Rocket Lab has also launched seven missions with HASTE, a suborbital version of Electron that allows customers to test hypersonic technologies in the space environment.