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Virgin Galactic, SSTL To Develop Commercial Satellite Launcher

Posted on: Tuesday, 3 February 2009, 13:15 CST

Virgin Galactic is collaborating with UK firm Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL) in hopes of developing low-cost rockets with the capability to put small satellites into orbit in a similar fashion to the US Pegasus system.

The companies hope to use Galactic’s White Knight Two system, which was unveiled last year and is intended to carry space tourists, as a more affordable means of delivering satellites into space.

"Hopefully we can do it for a lot less money than the current providers,” Dr Adam Baker of SSTL told the Press Association.

"It costs something like five million to 10 million dollars at the moment to get one of our smaller satellites into space. What we are targeting is to see if we can do this for a million dollars.”

"I think that's a very challenging number but I'm confident we can get very close to that - and if you could build the satellite itself for a couple of million dollars, all of a sudden you've got a very attractive package for well under five million dollars that lets your customers do something pretty capable in orbit."

Baker added that he hoped the two firms would be able to develop a system capable of carrying payloads of at least 50kg into an orbit altitude of at least 248 miles above Earth .

SSTL, known for its use of earth-monitoring satellites for its Disaster Monitoring Constellation, hopes to use a carrier aircraft to carry a two-stage rocket underneath.

"If we had our own launcher - something modest, not an enormous vehicle - for a reasonable price, we could service our own needs, both scientific and military, and we could also sell the service on the open market."

Virgin Galactic hopes to solve this issue by using its carrier airplane, the White Knight Two, to release a British satellite launcher.

Will Whitehorn, the president of Virgin Galactic, also said its rocket launcher has the potential for scientists who want to conduct microgravity research.

"You could take scientists up instead of space tourists and they could conduct their experiments 'live' in the period of microgravity you get on SpaceShipTwo, which is greater than you can get currently with zero-G aircraft.

"And of course you would have the scientists there in a way you couldn't with a sounding rocket, for example."

SSTL and Virgin Galactic are hoping to get the backing of the UK science and innovation minister, Lord Drayson, in trying to see if there is interest in government in helping to fund a short feasibility study, according to BBC News.

If they do develop a launcher system, it would be a commercial service, not a government operation.


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On The Net:

SSTL

Virgin Galactic

EADS Astrium

Scaled Composites

Hyperbola (Flight Global)

Source: redOrbit staff

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