Rocket Lab is the second company to launch TROPICS cubesats. The first, California-based Astra, attempted to loft two of them in June 2022, but its rocket suffered an anomaly during flight and the cubesats were lost. NASA then selected Rocket Lab to launch the remaining four TROPICS craft over two missions.

Rocket Lab successfully launched a second batch of NASA weather-tracking satellites into space from New Zealand late Thursday after the mission had suffered repeated weather delays earlier in the week.

The last two of NASA’s four surviving hurricane-tracking TROPICS satellites made it to orbit after a successful launch and deployment by small-rocket company Rocket Lab on Friday.

NASA successfully launched the final pair of satellites for its TROPICS mission from New Zealand. The four CubeSats in the mission will provide hourly updates on tropical cyclones, improving upon the current six-hour intervals,

Weather has again delayed a Rocket Lab launch of two NASA weather-tracking satellites from New Zealand, officials said.

Just ahead of the opening of the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season on June 1, the final two members of a novel cubesat quartet were launched into orbit to track developing storms on a near-hourly basis.