German Rocket Breaks New Ground: First Orbital Launch from Western Europe

At 4:12 p.m. EDT (10:12 p.m. local time) on September 5, a sleek, 95‑foot‑tall German rocket roared away from the Andøya Space Center in northern Norway. Within a little over seven minutes the vehicle settled into an elliptical orbit, carving a new chapter in European spaceflight history.

“This is right now making history — making history for Spectrum, making history for Isar, making history for Europe,” said Nikolaos Perakis, Spectrum’s chief engineer, during the live webcast co‑produced with NASASpaceflight. His excitement was contagious; the whole team could hardly hide their pride.

The flight, dubbed “Onward and Upward,” was the second attempt for Spectrum. Its maiden voyage in March 2025, whimsically called “Going Full Spectrum,” ended in a crash‑landing less than a minute after lift‑off. An investigation pinpointed an unintended vent‑valve opening and a loss of attitude control during a roll maneuver as the culprits.

Isar Aerospace didn’t sit on those findings. Over the following months, they wrestled with a pressurisation‑valve glitch, battled bad weather, and even had to scrub a launch because a stray boat drifted too close. A leak in a composite‑overwrapped pressure vessel delayed an April try, and fluid‑system anomalies forced a June stand‑down. Yet each setback was met with stubborn engineering tweaks, and finally the rocket rolled back to the pad for today’s launch.

Unlike its predecessor, Spectrum carried a modest but meaningful payload this time: five cubesats and a non‑deployable scientific experiment. After the initial elliptical orbit—about 112 mi at its low point and 311 mi at its high point—the upper stage performed a circularisation burn. Only then could the payloads be released, a step Isar confirmed via X about two hours after liftoff.

With a payload capacity of roughly 2,200 lb (1,000 kg) to low‑Earth orbit, Spectrum is being groomed as a workhorse for small‑to‑medium satellite missions. The company’s Munich‑area factory is already geared to produce more than 30 rockets a year, a clear sign of ambition.

While Spectrum is the first to reach orbit from Western Europe, it’s worth noting that the continent isn’t new to launches. Russia’s Plesetsk Cosmodrome, sitting on the European side of the Ural Mountains, has been sending rockets into space for about six decades. Still, today’s success feels different—a home‑grown European triumph that could reshape the launch market.