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The space programme of Kenya has been largely shaped by Kenya's equatorial latitude, and has basis of existed foreign infrastructure and experience. The development of the programme started in May 2012.
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| Beyond the Earth: How does Kenya benefit from Luigi Broglio Space Center? (Part 2) |
The first satellite launched from Kenya's soil was in 1970. The satellite, named Uhuru, was equipped to study celestial X-ray astronomy.[ citation needed ] Kenya was involved in the launching of the San Marco Malindi satellites. Discussions for a space center began in 1983, but stalled. [1]
Estimated costs for the space center are KSh.10 billion/=. The main goal of the space agency is to develop Earth observation satellites that can be used to monitor things from the weather to ongoing violence. The space center project is being driven by Dr. John Kimani, the lead scientist at the Ministry of Defence. [1]
As one of only a handful of equatorial states, and because it is bordered to the east by the Indian Ocean, Kenya is ideally sited for a spaceport to efficiently launch satellites into geostationary and other orbits. [1]
The closest regional facility, and the only one ever active in East Africa, is the Italian-owned Broglio Space Centre (also known as San Marco) near the Kenyan coast. In 1962, the agreements between Italy and Kenya and between University of Rome La Sapienza and Royal Technical College (now University of Nairobi) were signed and prolonged later for using of Kenyan territorial waters and building of base camp for two main sea platforms of the spaceport on Kenyan territory near Ras Ngomeni and Ungwana Bay. Later, for servicing of San Marco spaceport among other needs, a tracking station in the nearest Kenyan city of Malindi was created (and still operates) by Italy and ESA.[ citation needed ]
After the end of the operation of the San Marco/Broglio space center by Italians, the Kenyan government attempted to found a mostly commercial national space programme based on a retake of this spaceport and the use of Malindi station but the idea caused economic and diplomatic troubles between Kenya and Italy and the idea was discarded.
In building a launchpad for modern rockets to be able to launch satellites into geostationary orbit, Kenya intends to involve other partners such as Ukraine [2] that already produce launch vehicles for sea-platform Sea Launch spaceports.[ citation needed ] The Kenyan government offered[ when? ] Ukraine the right to develop the spaceport for launch of its own rockets and the facilities for assembly of satellites. The collaboration with Sapienza University of Rome has allowed to produce 1KUNS-PF, [3] [4] [5] the first Kenyan nano-satellite, consisting in a 1U CubeSat developed both by the University of Nairobi (the ex-Royal Technical College) and the S5Lab research team of the Italian University. The satellite was launched on 11 May 2018 from the International Space Station.
In Andy Weir's novel Artemis Kenya achieves dominance in the Space launch industry due to its fuel-saving location on the equator and political changes made by the government in the book. [6]
The Guiana Space Centre, also called Europe's Spaceport, is a spaceport to the northwest of Kourou in French Guiana, a overseas region of France in South America. Kourou is located approximately 500 kilometres north of the equator at a latitude of 5°. In operation since 1968, it is a suitable location for a spaceport because of its near equatorial location and open sea to the east and north.
The Italian Space Agency is a government agency established in 1988 to fund, regulate and coordinate space exploration activities in Italy. The agency cooperates with numerous national and international entities who are active in aerospace research and technology.
Malindi is a town on Malindi Bay at the mouth of the Sabaki River, lying on the Indian Ocean coast of Kenya. It is 120 kilometres northeast of Mombasa. The population of Malindi was 119,859 as of the 2019 census. It is the largest urban centre in Kilifi County.
The Luigi Broglio Space Center (BSC) located near Malindi, Kenya, is an Italian Space Agency (ASI) Spaceport. It was named after its founder and Italian space pioneer Luigi Broglio. Developed in the 1960s through a partnership between the Sapienza University of Rome's Aerospace Research Centre and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the BSC served as a spaceport for the launch of both Italian and international satellites (1967–1988). The center comprises a main offshore launch site, known as the San Marco platform, as well as two secondary control platforms and a communications ground station on the mainland.
The National Institute for Aerospace Technology "Esteban Terradas" is an autonomous agency of the Spanish public administration dependent on the Secretariat of State for Defence (SEDEF). It is responsible for the aerospace, aeronautics, hydrodynamics, and defense and security technologies research.
The European Space Tracking (ESTRACK) network consists of a number of ground-based space-tracking stations belonging to the European Space Agency (ESA), and operated by the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany. The stations support various ESA spacecraft and facilitate communications between ground operators and scientific probes such as XMM-Newton, Mars Express, BepiColombo, Gaia. Similar networks are run by the USA, China, Russia, Japan, and India.
This is a timeline of first orbital launches by country. While a number of countries, incl. Canada, Australia, Germany, Brazil, Algeria, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Argentina, Italy, Malaysia, Poland, South Africa, the Philippines, Egypt, Spain, Mexico, Thailand and Chile, have built or launched satellites, as of 2022, eleven countries, incl. the United States, Japan, China, India, Iran, Israel, France, the United Kingdom and South Korea, have had the capability to send objects into orbit with their own launch vehicles. Russia and Ukraine inherited the capability of the space launchers and satellites from the Soviet Union, following its dissolution in 1991. Russia launches its rockets from its own and foreign (Kazakh) spaceports.
The development of Ugandan space initiatives has been largely shaped by that country's position on the equator. Its history is marked by an early involvement in issues of space law, and in 2022 by the launch of its first satellite, PearlAfricaSat-1.
San Marco, the Italian form of Saint Mark, is one of the six sestieri of Venice. It may also refer to:
A near-equatorial orbit is an orbit that lies close to the equatorial plane of the object orbited. Such an orbit has an inclination near 0°. On Earth, such orbits lie on the celestial equator, the great circle of the imaginary celestial sphere on the same plane as the equator of Earth. A geostationary orbit is a particular type of equatorial orbit, one which is geosynchronous. A satellite in a geostationary orbit appears stationary, always at the same point in the sky, to observers on the surface of the Earth.
AGILE was an X-ray and gamma ray astronomical satellite of the Italian Space Agency (ASI). Launched in 2007, it de-orbited in February 2024.
The San Marco programme was an Italian satellite launch programme conducted between the early 1960s and the late 1980s. The project resulted in the launch of the first Italian-built satellite, San Marco 1, on 15 December 1964. With the programme Italy became the third country in the world to operate a launch with its own crew, after the Soviet Union and the United States, and the fifth to operate its own satellites after also Canada, and the United Kingdom.
San Marco 1, also known as San Marco A, was the first Italian satellite. Built in-house by the Italian Space Research Commission on behalf of the National Research Council, it was the first of five as part of the Italian-US San Marco programme.
Luigi Broglio, was an Italian aerospace engineer, airforce lieutenant colonel and dean of the school of aeronautical engineering at the University of Rome La Sapienza. Known as "the Italian von Braun", he is best known as the architect of the San Marco programme.
This article discusses bilateral relations between Kenya and Italy.
Broglio may refer to:
1KUNS-PF was the first Kenyan-owned satellite. The cubesat was developed and assembled by the University of Nairobi for the Kenya Space Agency, with technical support provided by Japan's Aerospace Exploration Agency. The spacecraft was deployed from the International Space Station are being launched by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
Carlo Buongiorno was an Italian aerospace engineer, first Director of the Italian Space Agency and professor at the Sapienza University, in Rome. He was a pivotal figure in the Italian space program.
The history of space in Africa is the history of space activity by or sent from Africa.
The Kenya Space Agency(KSA) is mandated to promote, coordinate and regulate space related activities in the country. It was established in 2017 as the successor to the National Space Secretariate (NSS).
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