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Spaceport
A spaceport or cosmodrome is a site for launching or receiving spacecraft, by analogy to a seaport for ships or an airport for aircraft. The word ''spaceport''—and even more so ''cosmodrome''—has traditionally referred to sites capable of launching spacecraft into Earth's orbit, Earth orbit or on interplanetary trajectories. However, rocket launch sites for Sub-orbital spaceflight, sub-orbital Sub-orbital spaceflight, spaceflights are also sometimes called spaceports, especially as new and proposed facilities for suborbital commercial spaceflight are often branded as "spaceports." Space station, Space stations and proposed future lunar bases are also sometimes referred to as spaceports, particularly when envisioned as nodes for further interplanetary travel. Spaceports are evolving beyond traditional government-run complexes into multi-functional aerospace hubs, increasingly driven by private companies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Virgin Galactic. A prominent example i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rocket Launch Site
This article constitutes a list of rocket launch sites. Some of these sites are known as spaceports or cosmodromes. A single rocket launch is sufficient for inclusion in the table, as long as the site is properly documented through a reference. Missile locations with no launches are not included in the list. Proposed and planned sites and sites under construction are not included in the main tabulation, but may appear in condensed lists under the tables. A shorter list of spaceports for human spaceflight and satellite launches is available in the article Spaceport. Table specification Sorting order * Countries in alphabetical order within a table * Launch sites within a country are sorted chronologically according to start of operations Column specification * Country – territory of the site (the organisation responsible for the launches may reside elsewhere, as indicated in the notes column; * Location – Name of launch site (sometimes also province etc.) * Coordinates – ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Virgin Galactic
Virgin Galactic Holdings, Inc. is a British-American spaceflight company founded by Richard Branson and the Virgin Group conglomerate, which retains an 11.9% stake through Virgin Investments Limited. It is headquartered in California, and operates from New Mexico. The company develops commercial spacecraft and provides suborbital spaceflights to Space tourism, space tourists. Virgin Galactic's suborbital spacecraft are air launched from beneath a carrier airplane known as White Knight Two. Virgin Galactic's maiden spaceflight occurred in 2018 with its VSS Unity, VSS ''Unity'' spaceship. Branson had originally hoped to see a maiden spaceflight by 2010, but the date was delayed, primarily due to the VSS Enterprise crash, October 2014 crash of VSS Enterprise, VSS ''Enterprise''. The company did the early work on the satellite launch development of LauncherOne before this was hive-off, hived off to a separate company, Virgin Orbit, in 2017. The company also has aspirations for subor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
SpaceX Starbase
SpaceX Starbase—previously, SpaceX South Texas Launch Site and SpaceX private launch site—is an industrial complex and rocket launch facility that serves as the main testing and production location for SpaceX Starship, Starship launch vehicles, as well as the headquarters of the American space technology company SpaceX. Located in Starbase, Texas, United States, and adjacent to South Padre Island, Texas, Starbase has been under near-continuous development since the late 2010s, and comprises a spaceport near the Gulf of Mexico, a production facility, and a test site along Texas State Highway 4. When initially conceptualized in the early 2010s, its stated purpose was "to provide SpaceX an exclusive launch site that would allow the company to accommodate its launch manifest and meet tight launch windows." The launch site was originally intended to support launches of the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch vehicles as well as "a variety of Reusable launch vehicle, reusable suborb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sub-orbital Spaceflight
A sub-orbital spaceflight is a spaceflight in which the spacecraft reaches outer space, but its trajectory intersects the surface of the primary (astronomy), gravitating body from which it was launched. Hence, it will not complete one orbital revolution, will not become an artificial satellite nor will it reach escape velocity. For example, the path of an object launched from Earth that reaches the Kármán line (about – above sea level), and then falls back to Earth, is considered a sub-orbital spaceflight. Some sub-orbital flights have been undertaken to test spacecraft and launch vehicles later intended for orbital spaceflight. Other vehicles are specifically designed only for sub-orbital flight; examples include crewed vehicles, such as the North American X-15, X-15 and SpaceShipTwo, and uncrewed ones, such as intercontinental ballistic missile, ICBMs and sounding rockets. Flights which attain sufficient velocity to go into low Earth orbit, and then de-orbit before com ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Launch Pad
A launch pad is an above-ground facility from which a rocket-powered missile or space vehicle is vertically launched. The term ''launch pad'' can be used to describe just the central launch platform (mobile launcher platform), or the entire complex (launch complex). The entire complex will include a ''launch mount'' or ''launch platform'' to physically support the vehicle, a service structure with umbilicals, and the infrastructure required to provide liquid-propellant rocket, propellants, cryogenic fluids, electrical power, communications, telemetry, rocket assembly, payload processing, storage facilities for propellants and gases, equipment, access roads, and drainage. Most launch pads include fixed service structures to provide one or more access platforms to assemble, inspect, and maintain the vehicle and to allow access to the spacecraft, including the loading of crew. The pad may contain a Flame deflector, flame deflection structure to prevent the intense heat of the roc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boca Chica (Texas)
Boca Chica is an area on the eastern portion of a subdelta peninsula of Cameron County, at the far south of the US state of Texas along the Gulf Coast. It is bordered by the Brownsville Ship Channel to the north, the Rio Grande and Mexico to the south, and the Gulf of Mexico to the east. The area extends about east of the city of Brownsville. The peninsula is served by Texas State Highway 4—also known as the Boca Chica Highway, or Boca Chica Boulevard within Brownsville city limits—which runs east–west, terminating at the Gulf and Boca Chica Beach. The Boca Chica area has seen various developments over the course of its history. These include Mexican land grants, Mexican and American ranches, a battlefield of the American Civil War, a 1920s beach resort, and a state park (Boca Chica State Park); additionally, a small settlement named Boca Chica Village existed in the area from 1960 to 2020. In recent years, the area has become more widely known due to being the si ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
SpaceX
Space Exploration Technologies Corp., commonly referred to as SpaceX, is an America, American space technology company headquartered at the SpaceX Starbase, Starbase development site in Starbase, Texas. Since its founding in 2002, the company has made numerous advancements in rocket propulsion, reusable launch vehicles, human spaceflight and satellite constellation technology. , SpaceX is the world's dominant space launch provider, its launch cadence eclipsing all others, including private competitors and national programs like the Chinese space program. SpaceX, NASA, and the United States Armed Forces work closely together by means of Government contractor, governmental contracts. SpaceX was founded by Elon Musk in 2002 with a vision of decreasing the costs of space launches, paving the way to SpaceX ambition of colonizing Mars, a sustainable colony on Mars. In 2008, Falcon 1 successfully launched into orbit after three failed launch attempts. The company then pivoted towar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Launch Vehicle
A launch vehicle is typically a rocket-powered vehicle designed to carry a payload (a crewed spacecraft or satellites) from Earth's surface or lower atmosphere to outer space. The most common form is the ballistic missile-shaped multistage rocket, but the term is more general and also encompasses vehicles like the Space Shuttle. Most launch vehicles operate from a launch pad, supported by a missile launch control center, launch control center and systems such as vehicle assembly and fueling. Launch vehicles are engineered with advanced aerodynamics and technologies, which contribute to high operating costs. An orbital spaceflight, orbital launch vehicle must lift its payload at least to the boundary of space, approximately and accelerate it to a horizontal velocity of at least . Suborbital spaceflight, Suborbital vehicles launch their payloads to lower velocity or are launched at elevation angles greater than horizontal. Practical orbital launch vehicles use chemical prope ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blue Origin
Blue Origin Enterprises, L.P. is an American space technology company headquartered in Kent, Washington. The company operates the suborbital New Shepard rocket and the heavy-lift New Glenn rocket. In addition to producing engines for its own rockets, Blue Origin supplies engines for other vehicles, including United Launch Alliance's Vulcan Centaur. It is also working on the Blue Moon (spacecraft), Blue Moon human lunar lander for NASA's Artemis program, the Blue Ring spacecraft platform, and the Orbital Reef space station in partnership with other organizations. Founded in 2000 by Jeff Bezos, Blue Origin initially operated with a stealth startup, very low profile, funded by Bezos's private investments. In 2015, the company achieved a significant milestone with the first uncrewed launch and landing of the New Shepard and announced plans for New Glenn. In 2021, New Shepard completed its first crewed mission with Bezos himself on board, crossing the Kármán line, the conventiona ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seaport
A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Hamburg, Manchester and Duluth; these access the sea via rivers or canals. Because of their roles as ports of entry for immigrants as well as soldiers in wartime, many port cities have experienced dramatic multi-ethnic and multicultural changes throughout their histories. Ports are extremely important to the global economy; 70% of global merchandise trade by value passes through a port. For this reason, ports are also often densely populated settlements that provide the labor for processing and handling goods and related services for the ports. Today by far the greatest growth in port development is in Asia, the continent with some of the world's largest and busiest ports, such as Singapore and the Chinese ports of Shanghai and Ningbo-Zhoushan. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rocket
A rocket (from , and so named for its shape) is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using any surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. Rocket engines work entirely from propellant carried within the vehicle; therefore a rocket can fly in the vacuum of space. Rockets work more efficiently in a vacuum and incur a loss of thrust due to the opposing pressure of the atmosphere. Multistage rockets are capable of attaining escape velocity from Earth and therefore can achieve unlimited maximum altitude. Compared with airbreathing engines, rockets are lightweight and powerful and capable of generating large accelerations. To control their flight, rockets rely on momentum, airfoils, auxiliary reaction engines, gimballed thrust, momentum wheels, deflection of the exhaust stream, propellant flow, spin, or gravity. Rockets for military and recreational uses date back to at least 13th-century China. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
California
California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an international border with the Mexico, Mexican state of Baja California to the south. With almost 40million residents across an area of , it is the List of states and territories of the United States by population, largest state by population and List of U.S. states and territories by area, third-largest by area. Prior to European colonization of the Americas, European colonization, California was one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse areas in pre-Columbian North America. European exploration in the 16th and 17th centuries led to the colonization by the Spanish Empire. The area became a part of Mexico in 1821, following Mexican War of Independence, its successful war for independence, but Mexican Cession, was ceded to the U ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
