CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Originally scheduled for Saturday evening, March 11, Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket launch from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia is now scheduled to launch Thursday night. The mission is to launch a satellite for the Earth observation company Capella Space.
The launch window is two hours long, from 6 p.m. local time to 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.
Due to the proximity of the time to sunset, it is possible the vapor trail from the rocket could be visible in the evening sky across the Carolinas. Complexities including the timing of the launch, the angle of the sun, and the cloud cover, could determine how easily the rocket is seen.
These launches after sunset are into a darkening sky, but the setting sun will illuminate the vapor trail high in the atmosphere as it goes up into orbit.
Now weather permitting, this launch should be visible to a large area of the East Coast from New England down to parts of Georgia.
You will want to start looking for east shortly after 6 p.m. and also watch the live stream to see when the rocket is about to take off. The trajectory is due east out over the Atlantic so that the best views will be farther east and higher in the sky.
The farther west you go, the lower in the sky the views will be.
Contact Brad Panovich at bpanovich@wcnc.com or follow him on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.