Rocket Lab launches private Earth-imaging satellite to orbit on its final flight of 2024 (video)

Rocket Lab launched a private Earth-observing radar satellite to orbit today (Dec. 21) on the company’s final mission of a busy 2024.

An Electron rocket lifted off from Rocket Lab‘s New Zealand site today at 9:16 a.m. EDT (1416 GMT; 3:16 a.m. Dec. 22 local New Zealand time), kicking off a mission called “Owl The Way Up.”

That name was a reference to the payload — one of Japanese company Synspective’s Strix radar-imaging satellites. (Strix is a widespread genus of owls.)

Everything went according to plan: The Electron deployed the Strix satellite into its target orbit 357 miles (574 kilometers) above Earth about 54.5 minutes after launch, according to the company.

Related: Rocket Lab launches 5 IoT satellites on landmark 50th mission (video)

“That rounds out 100% mission success for every launch this year. Congratulations team and thanks to all the customers that have flown with us in 2024. On to 2025…….” Rocket Lab founder and CEO Peter Beck said via X shortly after payload deployment.

Synspective has booked a total of 16 Electron launches to build out the Strix constellation in low Earth orbit, a system of “synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites designed to deliver imagery that can detect millimeter-level changes to the Earth’s surface from space,” Rocket Lab wrote in a mission description.

“Owl The Way Up” was the sixth of these 16 missions to fly.

Rocket Lab has now launched a total of 55 Electron missions to date, 14 of them this year. The company has also conducted three flights with HASTE, a suborbital version of Electron that serves as a testbed for hypersonic technology.

“Owl The Way Up” was originally supposed to launch on Friday (Dec. 20), but that attempt was scrubbed due to a sensor issue.

Editor’s note: This piece was updated at 9:45 a.m. ET on Dec. 20 to reflect the scrub. It was updated again at 10:55 a.m. ET on Dec. 21 with news of successful launch and payload deployment.

Michael Wall is a Senior Space Writer with Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, “Out There,” was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor’s degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.