Two American companies report that they carried out successful test launches of sounding rockets from a platform in the Gulf of Mexico on May 22. Experts are confident that the implementation of regular sea launches will allow unloading US ground-based spaceports in the face of a growing number of private launches.
Private companies launched rockets from the sea
On Tuesday, May 23, the American Spaceport Company announced that on the eve of May 22, they and their partners from Evolution Space conducted several launches of sounding rockets from floating platforms located in the territorial waters of the United States.
4 rockets were launched in total. The exact place where it happened was not disclosed, but the day before the US Federal Aviation Administration declared a small area of the sea south of Gulfport, Mississippi, a closed zone for flights. The main task of these launches according to the management of Spaceport Company is to obtain the necessary data for further development.
“This demonstration provided numerous lessons which will be incorporated into our next project: building a sea-based spaceport capable of orbital operations,” said Tom Marotta, chief executive and founder of The Spaceport Company, in a statement.
Why does the Spaceport Company need a floating spaceport?
Spaceport Company specializes exclusively in the construction of floating spaceports. The launches were conducted by Evolution Space, which recently became a full-fledged operator of space carriers. On April 22, its rocket, launched from the Mojave Cosmodrome, overcame the Kármán line, the conditional boundary of space (100 km).
As for the Spaceport Company, it plans to become a serious player in the American space market thanks to its floating spaceports. The fact is that the number of launches of private companies is growing all the time. Ground launch pads are overloaded, and it is extremely difficult and expensive to build new ones.
According to the same Marotta, it is much cheaper to build floating platforms. Of course, they will not be able to completely replace a ground-based spaceport, but at least some of the small launches can be transferred to them.
According to spacenews.com.
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