UK spaceport proposed for Sutherland site | Hacker News Reader

UK spaceport proposed for Sutherland site

bbc.co.uk

58 pointsteh_klev30 comments

Now if Scotland leave the UK and rejoin the EU (and I don't blame them after this Brexit mess) then the UK will lose out on it's brand new spaceport.

On the plus side, it's remote.

But it's hard to get my satellite there, and the weather there doesn't seem ideal for launching rockets.

I'd expect the east of the UK to be better for both access and available launch dates. Perhaps air traffic corridors are a problem.

I would assume that its for specific orbits - Ascension Island would make a better site for traditional launches.

I wonder if they’re also thinking about the future of suborbital transport? It seems distant to me, but it might play into the investment if they think this could be the Heathrow of suborbital transit in the future.

Heathrow would be the Heathrowof civilian suborbital transit.

Possibly, Heathrow is pretty crowded, but somewhere within half an hour of London yes. A site on HS2, preferably in the most NIMBYest area, would be good.

I don't think the northern tip of Scotland is the best place to put a suborbital transport facility.

Yep, I agree Scotland is fine for polar and sun-synchronous orbits.

Have you ever tried to drive a lorry with a satellite on it from here to Ascension? (It's a tricky road - lol!)

If you can't afford to fly it to Ascension, you can't afford to launch it.

> it's hard to get my satellite there

Pretty sure if your satellite doesn't fit on the back of a lorry you're going to have a hard time launching it from anywhere. What does this even mean

As long as spaceport is by the sea you can ship your satellite to it.

wait a second. can I launch my own satellite into outer space?

Absolutely, it just costs money.

For the low price of only $80,000, you can launch your own 1U cubesat with Rocket Lab [1]. For that price, you can launch a 10x10x10cm satellite, with a maximum weight of 1.3 kg, into a 500 km sun synchronous orbit.

[1] https://www.rocketlabusa.com/book-my-launch/

How long would a satellite like that last before being destroyed?

Well, it's complicated, but maybe 25 years.

Here's a reference that's totally on point:

http://mstl.atl.calpoly.edu/~bklofas/Presentations/Developer...

"An Evaluation of CubeSat Orbital Decay" - everything you wanted to know (and more!) about the topic.

They're planning on launching Electron rockets from the site, which have a payload of 150–225 kg.

You could fit that kind of payload in the boot of your car.

> On the plus side, it's remote.

It is actually relatively accessible compared to the other two proposed spaceport sites, which are both on relatively remote islands: Unst on the Shetland Islands, and North Uist in the Outer Hebrides Islands[0].

[0] http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2018/07/16/unst-spaceport-sti...

Can't find a reference now, but apparently there's a "weather hole" over the area that gives it unusually high number of clear days. Related to the North Atlantic Current.

It's also handy for satellites constructed in Glasgow by ClydeSpace and others: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/38804310 "In the last two years Glasgow has built more satellites than any other city in Europe".

Interesting that they didn't mention Rocket Lab at all in the article, who are the actual builder of the Electron rocket.

Rocket Lab are only partially owned by Lockheed Martin.

They gave a photo credit to Rocket Lab at the least.

> The UK Space Agency said the site in Sutherland was chosen as it is the best place in the UK to reach highly sought-after satellite orbits with vertically launched rockets.

Does anyone know what they mean by this? Usually rocket launch sites try to be as close to the equator as possible so why did they pick such a northerly location this time?

If you are going for a polar orbit (ie. circling from one pole to the other), any initial speed you pick up from the rotation of the earth will need to be cancelled out by burning fuel.

So the further north (or south) you go, the lower that speed is (since you are closer to the rotation axis).

If you’re going for an equatorial orbit, that initial speed is helping you, so you maximise it by launching as far away from the axis as possible (ie. somewhere close to the equator).

It makes me wonder whether there is any place further north than Sutherland where the ESA could set up (or has already set up).

Why not Svalbard.

Svalbard is a bit tricky - while it is part of Norway (which itself is part of the ESA), it has military restrictions, and other countries can operate commercially from there.

There is a (suborbital) rocket launch facility there to study aurora etc, but it's limited to 4 launches per year.

Greenland could be a good site -- I believe they are still a member of ESA through Denmark, so Qaanaaq would be a great place for polar launches, weather and access permitting.

I don‘t know why nobody is mentioning it, but Esrange[1] in Kiruna is an active European launch site, arguably far more North than Sutherland. Even though launcher activities seem to be limited to sounding/sub-orbital rockets at the moment, I don‘t see a reason why they should be restricted to it.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esrange

It has a weather hole that gives it more clear days then other places.

Sun-Synchronous orbits. Earth observing satellites like them, they're good when launched from high altitude, and a lot of the newspace smallsat market is in earth-obs with modern optics and processing.

A sun-sync orbit keeps the satellite in the sun (out of Earth's shadow) and typically peels a whole pass of the planet every few days, IIRC.

(also Polar orbits, but there are fewer of those)

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