Shiloh was a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

Brevard County Brevard County ( ) is a county located in the east central portion of the U.S. state of Florida. As of the 2020 census, the population was 606,612, making it the 10th-most populated county in Florida. The official county seat is located in T ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. It is the northernmost place in Brevard County. Scottsmoor also shares the title, across the Indian River. Shiloh is currently uninhabited. It was an active community during the turn of the 19th to the 20th Century. During the beginning of the Space Age, the village was later annexed to

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

John F. Kennedy Space Center The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the NASA, National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten NASA facilities#List of field ...

(KSC),

Merritt Island, Florida Merritt Island is a peninsula, commonly referred to as an island, in Brevard County, Florida, United States, located on the eastern Floridian coast, along the Atlantic Ocean. It is also the name of an unincorporated town in the central and sout ...

Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge is a U.S. National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) on the Atlantic coast of Florida's largest barrier island. NASA's Kennedy Space Center and visitor complex are also situated on the island and NASA can restrict acc ...

, and the

Canaveral National Seashore The Canaveral National Seashore (CANA) is a National Seashore located between New Smyrna Beach and Titusville, Florida, in Volusia and Brevard Counties. The park, located on a barrier island, was created on January 3, 1975, by an act of Congress. ...

. Shiloh is a "dark sky" site used by the Kennedy Space Center Amateur Astronomers and the Brevard Astronomical Society for astronomical observation and imaging.

Proposed spaceport

In the early 2010s, the Shiloh area was proposed by

Space Florida Space Florida is the aerospace economic development agency of the State of Florida. The agency was created by consolidating three existing state space entities into a single new organization via the Space Florida Act, enacted in May 2006 by the ...

as a potential location for the development of a

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

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 been used for sites capable ...

. Located immediately north of the U.S. Government's Kennedy Space Center, the open access to the flyover range on the open

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

to the east, and easy access to the tracking facilities of the

Eastern Test Range The Eastern Range (ER) is an American rocket range (Spaceport) that supports missile and rocket launches from the two major launch heads located at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and the Kennedy Space Center (KSC), Florida. The range ha ...

make the location attractive on many margins. Among other potential users of the spaceport facility,

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is an American spacecraft manufacturer, launcher, and a satellite communications corporation headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the stated goal of ...

was reported to be considering Shiloh as one of several potential locations for building a commercial launch facility. Opponents of the proposed Shiloh launch location cite the potential for a negative impact on the natural environment; particular as this area is home to several species listed as endangered or threatened. Even though the National Air & Space Administration has yet to agree to turn over the land to the state of Florida for commercial development, NASA has agreed to let the Federal Aviation Administration lead an environmental impact study at the proposed site. SpaceX ended up selecting

Brownsville, Texas Brownsville () is a city in Cameron County in the U.S. state of Texas. It is on the western Gulf Coast in South Texas, adjacent to the border with Matamoros, Mexico. The city covers , and has a population of 186,738 as of the 2020 census. It ...

to build its private spaceport. On May 2, 2013, the Volusia County Council voted 6-1 in favor of a commercial launch site at Shiloh. Though largely symbolic in nature, the vote was considered by many to be a critical step toward any future development of the proposed Shiloh location.Volusia County supports launches at Shiloh complex at north end of KSC , News - Home
/ref> After difficulties gaining support from environmental groups and others, Space Florida began looking in July 2014 for alternatives to the Shiloh location that would facilitate

space launch pads on the Florida

Space Coast The Space Coast is a region in the U.S. state of Florida around the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. It is one of several "themed" coasts around Florida. All orbital launches from American soil carrying NASA astr ...

. These include working with the

Air Force Space Command The atmosphere of Earth is the layer of gases, known collectively as air, retained by Earth's gravity that surrounds the planet and forms its planetary atmosphere. The atmosphere of Earth protects life on Earth by creating pressure allowing for ...

to see about converting some of the very large amount of unused military launch pads at

Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) is an installation of the United States Space Force's Space Launch Delta 45, located on Cape Canaveral in Brevard County, Florida. Headquartered at the nearby Patrick Space Force Base, the station ...

(south of Shiloh) to

state State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * ''Our S ...

land that might be used as a commercial spaceport.

Geography

Shiloh was the part of

Merritt Island Merritt Island is a peninsula, commonly referred to as an island, in Brevard County, Florida, United States, located on the eastern Floridian coast, along the Atlantic Ocean. It is also the name of an unincorporated town in the central and sout ...

between the

Old Haulover Canal The Haulover Canal is a waterway north of Merritt Island, Florida, near the former site of Allenhurst, that connects Mosquito Lagoon with the Indian River, and is part of the Intracoastal Waterway. In the early 1960s there were plans to relocate ...

to the south, and

Volusia County Volusia County (, ) is located in the east-central part of the U.S. state of Florida, stretching between the St. Johns River and the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the county was home to 553,543 people, an incr ...

to the north. It is still used in the atlas of Brevard County. Shiloh is located at .

Surrounding areas

Wilson Wilson may refer to: People * Wilson (name) ** List of people with given name Wilson ** List of people with surname Wilson * Wilson (footballer, 1927–1998), Brazilian manager and defender * Wilson (footballer, born 1984), full name Wilson Ro ...

* Scottsmoor *

References

{{Reflist Merritt Island, Florida