Tag: Bowen Spaceport

Gilmour scrubs launch attempt today

9:51 am

The Australian rocket startup Gilmour Space has scrubbed its first attempt to launch its Eris rocket from its own Bowen spaceport on the eastern coast of Australia.

Our team identified an issue in the ground support system during overnight checks. We’re now in an extended hold to work through it. Our next target is the Friday morning launch window.

The company has a two week launch window extending through the end of the month. If it can’t launch in that window then it will try again in the second half of June, assuming the bureaucracy of the Australian Space Agency issues a revised licence. It took that government three years to issue this license, so assuming it will work quickly to issue a revision is a dangerous thing.

The company is not providing a live stream of the launch, though it has said it will release a full video after the fact.

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Gilmour announces target date for first launch of its Eris rocket

8:32 am

Australian commercial spaceports
Australia’s commercial spaceports. Click for original map.

The rocket startup Gilmour Space today announced that it is targeting March 15, 2025 for the first orbital test of its Eris rocket, lifting off from its private Bowen spaceport on the east coast of Australia.

The news follows final airspace approvals from the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) and Airservices Australia, clearing the last regulatory hurdle before launch. It also marks the culmination of years of innovative R&D and manufacturing by the Gold Coast-based company, which developed the Eris launch vehicle and Bowen Orbital Spaceport in North Queensland.

Gilmour Space made history in March last year when its Bowen spaceport was granted the first orbital launch facility licence in Australia, and when it secured the country’s first Australian Launch Permit for Eris TestFlight 1 in November. Now, with airspace arrangements finalised and mandatory notice given to the Australian Space Agency, the company is preparing for liftoff.

Obtaining its permits from Australia’s government has taken years. The company first hoped to launch in 2022, but the red tape stymied that possibility.

If successful however this company’s achievement will be multifold. It will not only beat into orbit numerous other startups in the U.S. and Europe, it will give Australia its own orbital rocket built in Australia. For a country whose government never had much interest in joining the world’s space power — and appeared for the past three years determined to squelch this private company — Gilmour’s achievement will be significant. If anything, its success could force that government to change its ways

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Australian rocket startup Gilmour Space appears to have finally gotten its launch license

3:29 pm

Australian commercial spaceports
Australia’s commercial spaceports. Click for original map.

According to two news reports (here and here) as well as an update today on the company’s website, the Australian rocket startup Gilmour Space has gotten its last government approval allowing it to finally do the first orbital test launch of its Eris rocket from its private Bowen launch site on the east coast of Australia.

Though the company has not yet announced a launch date, the news reports and previous announcements suggest it will occur in late March. This document [pdf] provides excellent details about the launch, including the range limitations and flight path. No live stream will be provided on this first launch attempt.

I expect more information to be announced either later today or tomorrow. If this is confirmed, it will have been a long time coming. Gilmour first applied for its launch license in April 2022, with the intention of launching that year. Unfortunately, Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) appears as slow and as difficult to work with as the United Kingdom’s Civil Aviation Authority. It took CASA almost three years to issue this license (assuming it has been issued). With that kind of red tape, I don’t know how Gilmour is going to become profitable. It certainly can’t wait three years between each launch.

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Australia issues licenses for two spaceports

9:27 am

Australian commercial spaceports
Australia’s commercial spaceports. Click for original map.

The Australian government has now issued permits for two different spaceports, making possibly orbital launches at both in the near future.

First the planning minister for the province of South Australia has issued final approval allowing launches at the Southern Launch facility on Australia’s southern coast, though that approval included serious restrictions, such as no rocket launched could be taller than 30 meters. He also placed limitations on the number of launches per year, 36, the amount of noise a launch could make, and added other rules “regarding cultural heritage and native vegetation management.”

The spaceport hopes to complete its first orbital launch by the end of next year. Not surprisingly, the leftists in Green Party opposed the spaceport.

Second, the Australian Space Agency issued a launch license to Gilmour Space at its Bowen spaceport on the eastern coast of Australia, seven months late. This quote from the company’s founder is instructive:

But Mr Gilmour said when he and his brother, James Gilmour, set out to be the first to build a rocket of its kind in Australia almost a decade ago, he never imagined that getting a [launch] permit would be the most difficult part. “In my wildest dreams, I didn’t think it’d take this long,” he said. “I honestly thought the environmental approval [to launch a rocket over the Great Barrier Reef] would take the longest, and we got that well over a year ago.”

The company had originally hoped to launch early this year. It still hopes to do so before the end of 2024.

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Gilmour’s Eris rocket now assembled and ready for launch from Bowen spaceport in Australia

10:43 am

Australian commercial spaceports
Click for original map.

The Austrialia rocket starup Gilmour has now assembled its first Eris rocket in anticipation of its first orbital test launch from that company’s Bowen spaceport on the east coast of Australia.

According to the report at the link, the launch could happen “in the coming weeks,” though no date has been set. Gilmour has already received its spaceport license from the Australian government, but has not yet gotten its launch license from the Australian Space Agency, despite putting in its application two years ago.

It appears there is now a race between this spaceport and the one on the south coast run by Southern Launch to launch first. Both are saying they will launch in mere weeks, but both are also awaiting launch approvals from the Australian Space Agency, which appears to be having difficulties making these first approvals. Either it is dragging its feet, or doesn’t know how to do this yet. Hopefully the bureaucrats will figure out how to say yes to freedom and let these spaceports and companies finally launch, before they run out of cash.

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Australian rocket startup gets government approval for its spaceport

9:55 am

Proposed Australian commercial spaceports

The Australian rocket startup Gilmour Space has now received a spaceport licence from the Australian government, allowing launches to occur from its Bowen spaceport on the northeast coast of Australia, as shown on the map to the right.

The company describes the approval from [Ed Husic Federal Minister for Industry and Science], who is also the minister in charge of the Australian Space Agency, as a vote of confidence in Gilmour’s technical capability, paving the way for the launch of Australia’s first sovereign-made rockets, ‘bridging Country to Sky’. Gilmour Space has also secured approval from the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, enabling the operation of the spaceport at Abbot Point.

Not all is unicorns and rainbows however. First, it appears Gilmour began negotiating for this approval two years ago, so the government took a looong time to say yes. The other spaceport on the map has been awaiting for a launch license for about the same length of time, and has still not gotten it.

Gilmour also wants to do its first test launch of its Eris rocket in the next few months, but it is still awaiting its launch license from the Australian Space Agency. We are therefore about to find out whether Australia’s government can issue that permit in the next few months, or will instead emulate Great Britain, and bog things down with endless red tape.

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