Orbital agrees to insure and help repair damaged launch pad

On Thursday, Orbital said it would insure the launch pad for future launches.

McAuliffe announced Orbital had reached an agreement with the Commonwealth this week on who will pay for the current repairs as well as any damage to the state-owned launch pad if there are similar mishaps in the future.

Last October, Orbital was launching an unmanned, medium-lift Antares rocket to boost a Cygnus cargo craft to the space station when an engine failed seconds after liftoff.

The Virginia Commercial Space Flight Authority was created in 1995 to promote commercial space activity, economic development and aerospace research in Virginia.

The spaceport is one of only four facilities licensed by the federal government to launch rockets into orbit. “The new agreement protects the Commonwealth’s assets at MARS against damage while at the same time providing a state-of-the-art launch facility for our customer, Orbital ATK, at a highly competitive price”.

State officials spent months renegotiating a contract with Dulles-based Orbital ATK, one of two companies under contract by NASA to deliver supplies to the global Space Station. State bonds financed a large portion of the launch pad’s almost $150 million cost.

“We see this as moving forward in a way that everybody is protected and everybody wins”, said Frank Culbertson, president of Orbital’s space systems group. I mean, obviously there’s room for all of us. “We’re not going to get that, but at least you’ve got to try”.

The governor is a big booster for luring commercial space business to the state, considering it part of what he calls the new Virginia economy.

Also on Thursday, NASA and Gov. Terry McAuliffe announced that a 3,000-foot unmanned aircraft systems runway would be built at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on the mainland of the Eastern Shore of Virginia.

Fix efforts are expected to be complete in the fall, with launches set to continue in 2016.