The Sky at Night TV program

[reddoss]

Tonight's episode is about the UK rocket industry.

It is on ait at 10pm on BBC4.

[DaveS]

Ah, you posted before me. Yes, should be interesting to some, but I expect to hear the usual complaints that it's not stargazing.

[Tomatobro]

I built a pneumatic rocket launcher and paper rockets for our local play group but I don't think I am featured on the program.

[DaveS]

If they're talking about what we laughably call the UK Space Industry then they need to get in touch with Jordan Wright, the Angry Astronaut. isn't it ironic the the best informed person is an Anglophile American?

[malc-c]

7 hours ago, reddoss said:

Tonight's episode is about the UK rocket industry.

 

Be a short program then as things relied on a now liquidated company to get any British rocket into space !!

I don't think the UK has done more since Blue Streak back in the late 50's early 60's

https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/films/1951to1964/filmpage_rocket.htm

 

[saac]

6 hours ago, Tomatobro said:

I built a pneumatic rocket launcher and paper rockets for our local play group but I don't think I am featured on the program.

Keep trying  - Per Ardua Ad Astra

Jim 

[saac]

7 hours ago, reddoss said:

Tonight's episode is about the UK rocket industry.

It is on ait at 10pm on BBC4.

Thanks for the heads up, I would have missed it otherwise. 

Jim

[DaveS]

We put a satellite into orbit in 1971 despite government interference, then promptly went to sleep. I blame a mentality in the civil service that knowing Ovid is more important than understanding Schrödinger.

[Ouroboros]

I think it’s what’s happening now. I understand Britain has quite a healthy space industry. 

“The Sky at Night team investigates the science and engineering helping the UK to blast into space. Chris visits a rocket company near Glasgow to find out how rockets are built.”

[JeremyS]

It’s not just about rockets, it’s the sophisticated payloads that are launched. This is where UK industry has a real strength. It’s the SPACE industry.
The negativity on here is really frustrating at times.

[DaveS]

On NOW.

[DaveS]

The negativity that you might perceive is born of my frustration at our lack of progress in launching, when I see any number of US private companies (Not just SpaceX) launching satellites.

[Naughty Neal]

Thus far missed the beginning but turned on to see solar talk and a teapot & a spoon .

[paulastro]

47 minutes ago, JeremyS said:

It’s not just about rockets, it’s the sophisticated payloads that are launched. This is where UK industry has a real strength. It’s the SPACE industry.
The negativity on here is really frustrating at times.

I would call it boring Jeremy.  Some people don't seem to be happy unless they're moaning about something.  Of course, it's not just confined to SGL

[saac]

We are one of the largest satellite providers in the world, I think largest in Europe. Work has been cleared for the Sutherland Space Hub which when operational will further strengthen our satellite design and manufacturing lead . For sure, just as we gave away our independent aviation industry from 1950s onward, we also stepped back from any lead we had in our British Space Programme (Black Arrow/Prospero) -  I suspect part political incompetence and also part of war reparations to USA via technology transfer.  Anyway, we are now back and in a growing position of strength, UK engineering at its best. 

Jim 

[saac]

Good episode, Maggie as always is such an authoritative commentator given her professional background, she exudes credibility. I enjoyed the interview with Professor Andy Lawrence (University of Edinburgh) on the issue of low earth orbit satellites and their conflict with astronomy. I thought his comments were balanced; didn't know that even Hubble suffers from satellites trails as well. 

Jim 

Edited June 13, 2023 by saac

[DaveS]

We are one of the largest satellite building nations, but we are now playing a very late catch up where launching is concerned.

We were the sixth country to launch a satellite ( Why so late? It's not as if we lacked the ability) but the ONLY country to give up that ability.

As I said above, I blame the lack of science qualifications in the civil service and among MPs.

[malc-c]

3 hours ago, DaveS said:

We are one of the largest satellite building nations, but we are now playing a very late catch up where launching is concerned.

We were the sixth country to launch a satellite ( Why so late? It's not as if we lacked the ability) but the ONLY country to give up that ability.

 

But that's about par for most things us Brits seem to do.  We develop things, often pioneering technology in whatever field and then for some reason seem to give up and be overtaken by other countries.  I mean India is not a country that comes to mind when looking at the subject, but they've managed to launch a probe to the moon, even though the ends result didn't manage to land.  

But maybe the whole process of developing a launch platform in todays commercial world is just not viable, especially give SpaceX's reusable Falcon rockets which are now launching one or two time a week (or so it seems).  Their goal of providing a cheap and sustainable rocket to reduce the cost of getting a payload into space and thus make it more viable and in reach of smaller companies is now well established.

I wonder where the UK would be if they hadn't cancelled the development  of their rocket program?  I doubt that we would have developed another Saturn 5, but I'm sure we would have managed something along the lines of Falcon / Dragon combo and providing an alternative to the current methods of resupplying the ISS both with supplies and crew.

[Highburymark]

I’ve now worked for three government departments which contribute to the UK space programme and there’s a huge amount of ambition (among civil servants and ministers) to grow our presence within the industry. We are certainly playing catch-up, but things are going in the right direction. Let’s hope it continues.

[Naughty Neal]

Gov't should have backed Branson's company and taken a stake in it,  one failure  and all down the pan.  The launch vehicle option with  the under slung rocket vehicle looked a good viable option.

They already know what went wrong and a small component part failed .

 

Gov't are willing to spend ten's /hundred of millions supplying missiles etc,etc, to Ukraine but not for space venture.

Edited June 13, 2023 by Naughty Neal

[DaveS]

4 hours ago, Highburymark said:

I’ve now worked for three government departments which contribute to the UK space programme and there’s a huge amount of ambition (among civil servants and ministers) to grow our presence within the industry. We are certainly playing catch-up, but things are going in the right direction. Let’s hope it continues.

That's good to know, let's hope they don't drop the ball again.

[ED Splitter]

Space industry is exactly that an industry. An international economy supplies it and we are a good part of that. It doesn’t start and end with rocket launches. Rocket launches take place at locations based on geography, the nearer the equator the better. It requires less fuel as the earth spins faster at the equator. Rocket launches chase every efficiency. We aren’t going to have a space x type outfit launching here. But we will continue to have incredible engineering outfits designing and manufacturing components to fulfil the supply chains to those rocket building companies and agencies.  

[DaveS]

Launching near the equator is all right provided you aren't aiming for a polar orbit, in which case a site nearer the pole is needed, hence Spaceport Sutherland and Saxa Vord.

Spaceport Cornwall is predicated on horizontal launches and landing. Dreamchaser is already lined up as a landing customer but we dropped the ball by not buying up Virgin Orbit when they went bankrupt.

[malc-c]

Interesting, that this discussion happens at a timely event - that being the 200th successful landing of Space X's Falcon booster 

[Louis D]

On 12/06/2023 at 06:58, DaveS said:

If they're talking about what we laughably call the UK Space Industry then they need to get in touch with Jordan Wright, the Angry Astronaut. isn't it ironic the the best informed person is an Anglophile American?

 

On 12/06/2023 at 15:03, DaveS said:

We put a satellite into orbit in 1971 despite government interference, then promptly went to sleep. I blame a mentality in the civil service that knowing Ovid is more important than understanding Schrödinger.

 

On 12/06/2023 at 16:11, DaveS said:

The negativity that you might perceive is born of my frustration at our lack of progress in launching, when I see any number of US private companies (Not just SpaceX) launching satellites.

Texas alone has SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Firefly Aerospace off the top of my head.  Then there's NASA's Mission Control in Houston.  As far as aerospace, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Sikorsky, BAE Systems, L3Harris, and many others have operations here as well.  And that is just one state in the US.