Space outfit Rocket Lab says its Hungry Hippo is ready to go into space, a fillip for the company’s plans to fly its new Neutron launch vehicle.

Hungry Hippo is a fairing – the nose cone used to protect payloads atop rockets from pressure and heat. Most rockets shed their fairings as they exit Earth’s atmosphere, and the structures usually burn up or fall into the ocean.

SpaceX recovers some of its fairings and re-uses them, to keep its costs low.

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Rocket Lab wants to go one better by making its fairings part of its planned Neutron rocket. The company’s plan calls for its fairings to spring apart – while in flight – to create an aperture wide enough for the second stage rocket to exit. Once the second stage is on the way, Hungry Hippo’s mouth will close, and the Neutron will return to Earth with the fairing intact.

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Here’s how it looks in action, on a test rig.

[4]Youtube Video

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Rocket Lab published the video above in May. On Monday the company announced Hungry Hippo has successfully completed qualification and said the first unit is on its way to its Virginia launch facility to be used on Neutron’s first launch. The company also posted some nice video of the fairing [6]here .

[7]Rocket Lab's Neutron slips to 2026: 'Our aim is to make it to orbit on the first try'

[8]Japan’s new space truck is also a temporary space lab, just worked first time

[9]Rocket Lab wants to dry off and reuse Electron booster recovered from the ocean

[10]Watch Rocket Lab lift off from US for first time, put radio-sniffing sats into orbit

As The Register has previously [11]reported , Rocket Lab has blown self-imposed deadlines to get Neutron into the sky in 2024 and 2025. The company now aspires to a 2026 launch. News that Hungry Hippo is ready to fly makes a launch next year more likely. If Rocket Lab can get Neutron flying, the company will have a vehicle that can carry weightier payloads than SpaceX’s Falcon 9 – the world’s current workhorse rocket – just in time to satisfy demand from satellite broadband companies that will collectively need thousands of launches to place their constellations in orbit.

Hungry Hippo may therefore have a lot on its plate. ®

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[6] https://x.com/RocketLab/status/1998143526014767542

[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/11/rocket_labs_neutron_slips_2026/

[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/10/31/jaxa_htv_x_success/

[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/19/rocket_lab_electron_recovery/

[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/01/26/rocket_lab_launch/

[11] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/11/rocket_labs_neutron_slips_2026/

[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/