French Developing Reusable Rocket

The French government’s two aerospace-focused agencies on Oct. 2 said they are pooling resources to study a launching system that would return its entire first stage to Earth for reuse, a goal shared by SpaceX but not one being pursued by Europe’s Airbus Defence and Space rocket prime contractor.

In a joint statement, the French space agency, CNES, and France’s ONERA aerospace research institute said the objective of the work is to “develop a rocket first stage that is capable of returning to its launch base.”

Earlier this year, Airbus disclosed that it had been working on a reusable design that would separate the rocket’s first-stage engines and part of the avionics suite for a return to Earth and later reuse.

Airbus said the value of the first stage lies mainly in its engines and that returning the entire first stage for refurbishment and reuse would not improve the economics of launching satellites.

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