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A Grand Day Out For British Rocketman
Instine writes "Salford University, in the UK, is showing an article suggesting that Britain's biggest ever rocket has been unveiled, by an academic planning a space tourism offering by 2013. 'Nova 2 qualifies as the biggest rocket ever created and flown from the UK mainland,' says Steve Bennett, Head of Salford's Space Technology Laboratory
The current offering is said to amount to 20 minutes 'flight' and 3-4 mins floating. I'm not sure how much, but I'd pay for that."
Not necessarily. You can launch from anywhere, it just costs you more to accelerate (slightly less starting speed than at the equator) and possibly more to get into the orbit you want.
Russia's Plesetsk Cosmodrome is further north than most of the UK and they certainly launch lots of stuff from there - though they prefer Baikonur, its politically more difficult....
For every expert, there is an equal and opposite expert. - Arthur C. Clarke
At the risk of being overly pedantic the tube train usually refers to the London underground rail system. Salford is up-north (next to Manchester) and not on the underground. Apart from driving (M60) you could use the Manchester tram system, British Rail, the Manchester Ship canal, or various buses.
init 11 - for when you need that edge.
Nova 2 qualifies as the biggest rocket ever created and flown from the UK mainland
It's because Britain used to have a rocket program in the 50s and 60s. All the launches of the large rockets were done from Woomera in the Australian outback. The biggest of these was Blue Streak developed as an ICBM. There are some pictures here
Not same guys at all. The TG Relaint Robin was done by "The Rocket Men" which is Damian Hall and Colin Rowe. Nova, Nov2 2 is by Steve Bennett. As for counting I would ride in a vehicle desgined by Damian/Colin but would steer well clear of Steve Bennett.