The ENOS recoverable spacecraft from Reditus Space will launch this fall. Credit: Reditus Space
WASHINGTON — Reditus Space, a startup developing recoverable and reusable spacecraft, has completed its first vehicle for launch later this year.
The company announced July 13 that it had finished assembling ENOS, a 200-kilogram reentry vehicle scheduled to launch later this year on a SpaceX rideshare mission. ENOS will spend two months in orbit before reentering and splashing down off the coast of Florida.
Reditus Space is one of several companies working on reentry vehicles that can return microgravity research and manufacturing payloads from orbit. The company, though, is taking a different technical approach to its vehicle.
“In contrast to a more traditional reentry mission where you would have a big satellite and a small capsule attached to it that makes its reentry, this is a singular system where more than 80% of the mass of the actual system makes its way back down to Earth to have the ability to be launched again in the future,” Stef Crum, the company’s chief executive, said in an interview.
