Vanguard – Lockheed Martin
- Family: Vanguard
- Length: 23 m
- Diameter: 1.14 m
- Launch Mass: 10 T
- Low Earth Orbit Capacity: 9 kg
The Vanguard, manufactured by Lockheed Martin established in 1953, undertook its inaugural launch on 10/23/1957. Notably, Vanguard has 3 successful launches and 8 failed attempts, with a cumulative tally of 11 launches, currently with 0 pending launches in the pipeline.
The Vanguard rocket was intended to be the first launch vehicle the United States would use to place a satellite into orbit. Instead, the Sputnik crisis caused by the surprise launch of Sputnik 1 led the U.S., after the failure of Vanguard TV3, to quickly orbit the Explorer 1 satellite using a Juno I rocket, making Vanguard I the second successful U.S. orbital launch.
