Yatharagga is an area associated with a

homestead Homestead may refer to: *Homestead (buildings), a farmhouse and its adjacent outbuildings; by extension, it can mean any small cluster of houses *Homestead (unit), a unit of measurement equal to 160 acres *Homestead principle, a legal concept th ...

in the

mid west The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

(WA) near

Yarragadee Station Yarragadee Station is a pastoral lease that currently operates as a cattle station. It is located about north of Mingenew and south of Mullewa in the Mid West region of Western Australia. The station is located along the Irwin River and ...

. It is located about north-west of Mingenew and about south-east of

Geraldton Geraldton (Wajarri: ''Jambinu'', Wilunyu: ''Jambinbirri'') is a coastal city in the Mid West region of the Australian state of Western Australia, north of the state capital, Perth. At June 2018, Geraldton had an urban population of 37,648. ...

. The area is also associated with two Australian Earth stations with space related tracking systems at the West Australian Space Centre.

Homestead

The Yatharagga is a ''homestead'' listed by the

Gazetteer of Australia The Gazetteer of Australia is an index or dictionary of the location and spelling of geographical names across Australia. Geographic names include towns, suburbs and roads, plus geographical features such as hills, rivers, and lakes. The index is ...

Yatharagga Satellite Station

''Yatharagga Satellite Station'' also known as ''West Australian Space Centre'' is owned and run by the

Swedish Space Corporation The Swedish Space Corporation (SSC) provides space subsystems, space and satellite operations, rocket and balloon systems including experiment equipment, launch services, aerospace engineering services as well as airborne maritime surveillance s ...

(SSC)'s subsidiary SSC Space Australia, and services a number of government agencies and commercial organisations. It commenced operations under SSC in 2012.

MOBLAS 5 Satellite Laser Ranging Station

Near the homestead is a facility ''MOBLAS 5

Satellite Laser Ranging In satellite laser ranging (SLR) a global network of observation stations measures the round trip time of flight of ultrashort pulses of light to satellites equipped with retroreflectors. This provides instantaneous range measurements of milli ...

'' (SLR) station originally established by an agreement between the

United States of America 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 territo ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

effective 27 June 1978 to establish a

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 ...

Temporary Mobile Satellite Laser Tracking Facility.

DORIS (geodesy)

Near the MOBLAS facility is a

DORIS (geodesy) DORIS is a French satellite system used for the orbit determination, determination of satellite orbits (e.g. TOPEX/Poseidon) and for position fixing, positioning. The name is an acronym of "Doppler Orbitography and Radiopositioning Integrated by ...

beacon, launched by

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

CNES The (CNES; French: ''Centre national d'études spatiales'') is the French government space agency (administratively, a "public administration with industrial and commercial purpose"). Its headquarters are located in central Paris and it is und ...

US Navy Telescope

A US Navy telescope is located adjacent to the MOBLAS 5 SLR.

Dongara Satellite Station

Dongara Satellite Station is adjacent to Yatharagga Satellite Station, and acts as mutual backup to the site. It is also part of the Swedish Space Corporation, however is owned by the US subsidiary.

References

{{reflist

External links

Carnavon Space Yatharagga: Satellite Laser Ranging (SLR) StationSSC Space Australia - Yatharagga Satellite StationSSC Universal Space Network - Dongara Satellite Station
Earth stations in Western Australia