Main Engine Cut OffScottish Spaceport Proposed
Russell Jackson, for The Scotsman:
A consortium, which includes US aerospace firm Lockheed Martin, believe that the A’Mhoine peninsula in Sutherland would be the ideal location in Britain from which satellites could be launched into orbit.
A detailed proposal for the facility - located between Dounreay and Cape Wrath - has been submitted to the UK Space Agency (UKSA) which has met with Highland council and Highlands and Islands Entreprise (HIE) to discuss the plans.
The Scottish base - which could be operational by 2020 - would be the first to launch a rocket into space from UK soil.
I always thought the north side of the UK would be a great spot for a polar launch site.
Some will liken this to the spaceport dilemma in the US, but it’s totally different. The troubled spaceports in the US all have a critical flaw in them for frequent commercial use: Spaceport America isn’t able to support orbital launches from its location (Mojave, too, for that matter), the Pacific Spaceport Complex is too remote, Wallops can only support highly-inclined-but-not-polar launches, and so on. Georgia may find itself in a similar situation as Wallops—unable to support polar launches and worse for GEO launches than Canaveral.
A polar orbit-specific launch site on UK soil has real potential.