First look: Rocket Lab’s US Neutron launch site

On the Atlantic coastline, within Nasa’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, stands an 86-metre-tall water tower, painted black and stamped with a Rocket Lab logo. It’s one of the more evident infrastructure developments at the site where the New Zealand-United States space company is preparing to launch its new rocket, Neutron. The tower will flow 200,000 gallons of water into the base of Neutron as it launches, to suppress the sound which would otherwise cause a vibration strong enough to obliterate the rocket.

The rocket’s launch pad will be three storeys high – its base has been dug out and poured with concrete, with piles cemented into the side to eventually hold the rocket’s base. “The construction takes a while and that’s been the longest pull,” Rocket Lab’s head of US test and launch Aaron Kuipers told Markets with Madison on a tour of the launch site..