September 2013: As Dale Nash takes his position to speak to a gaggle of space press, corporate VIPs, and social media guests, he has a dramatic backdrop: About 50 feet behind him stands a stark white 80-foot rocket loaded with a lunar orbiter and tucked inside a rectangular building but visible through massive, open doors. Now it has a new tenant in the form of Rocket Lab, which is looking to be able to launch it's Proton rocket from not only New Zealand but also the U.S.A., allowing the company to launch more frequently. ![]() NASA swooped in to bring Wallops back to life, and the spaceport was soon up and running again. In 2014, an uncrewed Orbital Antares rocket headed to resupply the International Space Station blew up and caused millions of dollars of damage to Wallops. As we wrote in this piece back in 2013, the place had a long history in launch as the oldest continuous rocket launch range in the United States, but nearly shuttered in the 1990s. It's been a down-and-then-up last five years for Wallops Island. ![]() ![]() The company cited the relatively quiet nature of Wallops as an appealing fact, whereas SpaceX and others are busy upping their launch schedules at some of those other sites. Wallops won out over finalists Vandenberg Air Force Base (California), the Pacific Spaceport Complex (Alaska), and Cape Canaveral (Florida). October 17, 2018: Rocket Lab, the New Zealand-based launch startup, just announced Wallops Island, Virginia as its choice for a site to launch rockets from the U.S.
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