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Scotland Could Become Home To Britain's First Spaceport
An anonymous reader writes Scotland could take a giant leap for mankind by becoming the home of Britain's first spaceport. UK Government ministers will announce on Tuesday eight potential sites for a base for sending rockets and tourists into orbit. RAF bases at Kinloss and Leuchars are believed to be among contenders for the spaceport, which would open in 2018 and be Britain's answer to Cape Canaveral. Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander said: "I am delighted that the government is pushing forward with its ambitious plans to open a spaceport in the UK by 2018. Spaceports will be key to us opening up the final frontier of commercial space travel. Scotland has a proud association with space exploration. We celebrated Neil Armstrong's Scottish ancestry when he became the first man on the Moon and only last week an amazing Scottish company was responsible for building the UK Space Agency's first satellite. The UK space industry is one of our great success stories and I am sure there will be a role for Scotland to play in the future."
Don't they try putting launching sites further south.
1. They are warmer and you don't need to de-ice your craft.
2. Uses less fuel as the earth is spinning faster
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
We'll give you SPACESHIPS if you stay! (promise)
Most of the commercial launches want equatorial orbits, and for that you want to launch as near to the equator as possible. As far as polar orbits for research satellites are concerned there is already the Kiruna site, which is fully equipped and at a better location for monitoring polar orbits. Polar orbits for secret missions? Countries involved in this will want to launch from their own turf. And space tourism? Does not exist yet.
Cynically I expect that this won't happen by 2018, and nobody expects it to. I think it is something that the government thinks will help get a "no" vote to Scottish independence.
How about getting the England football team beyond the first round for the next world cup? This I see as a much better plan for 2018.
We prefer realistic goals.
Secret missions possibly. The UK government might want a domestic launch site, rather than have to entrust France with all their secret missions.
Or it might be, as many speculate, pure politics: This isn't coming from down London, this is being pushed by Scottish politicians. A big, expensive, high-tech project like that could do much to showcase Scotland as an economic success, stressing both to their own citizens and the rest of the world that they don't need the rest of the UK. There's a strong emphesis on the article on spaceplanes, a form of commercial aeronautics still in the development stage - having one of the first useable facilities would be a great prestige.
How about getting the England football team beyond the first round for the next world cup? This I see as a much better plan for 2018.
We prefer realistic goals.
David Cameron is currently undertaking a feasibility study on the possibility of holding a piss-up in a brewery.
If it is political theatre, 'spaceplanes' are doubly convenient: not only are they the new-and-cutting-edge-hotness, they also have ground requirements much closer to 'airport with atypically long runway' rather than the sort of expensive and specialized apparatus that very large vertically launched systems often do (the KSC's Crawler-Transporter vehicles are undeniably endearing; but not something I'd want to cost-justify...)
If the PR renders are anything to go by, you can pretty much take an existing airfield, knock down any ugly buildings that the media might see, and replace them with cool, ultramodern equivalents, and you've got a spaceport.
If they would only be good little subjects and vote to remain part of Britain so England can still pretend to be an imperial power?
No, they are free to, you know, pay for it themselves if they vote no rather than yes. No one will attempt to stop and independent Scotland building a spaceport with it's newly minted Caledonian Dollars or whatever currency they end up on.
In the mean time, do you expect Parliament to simply act as if scotland is already not part of the UK? I suspect you'd be whiny about that too if it happened.
Or do you expect the UK as a whole to basically put large infrastructure on hold because a small fraction of the population eant to seceed?
So far, the best reason for a yes vote is because the "West Lothian Question" is blatantly unfair and undemocratic, but since it goes in Scotland's favour, I've not heard a peep out of that crowd about it.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
In that case the normal move is to place it in Australia. Lots of space, stable government and strong social, economic and political ties. As for secrecy already a part of 5 Eyes, so not a problem there, likely when it comes to 5 Eyes they likely could shift a large percentage of that cost to that alliance, so Australia, Canada, New Zealand UK and US would all chip in to fund it. Reason why Scotland, straight up carrot and stick for the independence vote. How will the Scots receive it, likely pretty badly as a straight up carrot and stick scam.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Relax, everyone. This is a non-story; it isn't going to happen, and no-one seriously expects it to.
We're having a referendum in September on whether to separate from the UK and become an independent nation. The UK government has woken up - very late - to the realisation that it's quite likely to lose, and consequently will also lose its only nuclear submarine base, 90% of its oil revenue, and probably its permanent seat on the UN security council. Consequently they're panicking and offering us all sorts of unlikely bribes. The spaceport won't happen because
So relax. The fact that there's no money and no commercial use for it, and that we're too far from the equator, doesn't matter; no-one seriously intends to build it. It's a media stunt, pure and simple. It isn't going to happen.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.