 | This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page . (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
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.
As one of only a handful of equatorial states, Uganda is ideally sited for a spaceport to launch satellites into geostationary orbit, but this option has never been pursued because of lack of investment in the country's project. [1] The closest regional facility, and the only one ever active in East Africa, is the Italian-owned Broglio Space Centre located off the coast of neighboring Kenya.
Uganda has never acquired any ballistic missile capability, the usual precursor to booster development. The only state in sub-Saharan Africa to ever do so was South Africa, which developed the RSA-3 and RSA-4 missiles in the 1980s, but, after the end of the apartheid regime, cancelled its nuclear weapons and later its ballistic missile programs by 1993. [2]
Uganda joined the first two international space law treaties, ratifying the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty on March 24, 1964, and acceding to the Outer Space Treaty on April 24, 1968. It was not, however, a party to the later Rescue Agreement of 1968, the Liability Convention of 1972, the Registration Convention of 1976 or the Moon Treaty of 1984.
Uganda was one of eight equatorial states that adopted the Bogota Declaration on December 3, 1976, which seemingly contradicted the Outer Space Treaty, but asserted that geostationary orbit was not "outer space" and constitutes national territory. [3]
When President Idi Amin came to power in a 1971 coup (at the Space Race climax of the Apollo lunar landings), his government developed an interest in UFO activity, and he even claimed to have personally witnessed a UFO over Lake Victoria in 1973. [4] In 1971, at the beginning of his regime, United Nations ambassador Grace Ibingira advocated an early form of post-detection policy to prevent Cold War provocation of hostilities with UFOs. [5] Near the end of the Amin era, Uganda also became the only other country to support Eric Gairy of Grenada's efforts for UN recognition of the phenomenon with a dedicated agency and declaring 1978 as the International Year of UFOs. [6]
There is a false report that Idi Amin also pursued a human spaceflight program, [7] but this may have been a conflation of his UFO interests and the personal project of Edward Makuka Nkoloso in Zambia the decade before. In June 1999, this report got some attention in the Time 100 magazine feature's "100 Worst Ideas of the Century". [8]
At the September 1996 Conference on Small Satellites: Missions and Technology in Madrid, Spain, informal proposals were raised for a Ugandan microsatellite project. [9] At the Third United Nations Conference on the Exploration and Peaceful Uses of Outer Space held in Vienna in July 1999, Semakula Kiwanuka said "space technology is a powerful tool for accelerating national development" and pointed out the benefits a space program would have for his country. [10] There have also been proposals for space science to be introduced at Mbarara University of Science & Technology. [11]
Space technology for a country like Uganda would be most relevant in the fields of environmental Earth observation satellites and communications. Uganda sent two representatives, Samuel Edward Sekunda of the Department of Meteorology and Yafesi Okia of the Department of Lands and Surveys, to the Regional Workshop on the Use of Space Technology for Outer Space Affairs organized by the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in July 2002. [12] Joel Arumadri of the National Environmental Management Authority (NEMA) represented Uganda at the April 2004 Regional Workshop on the Use of Space Technology for Natural Resources Management, Environmental Monitoring and Disaster Management in Khartoum, Sudan. [13]
The Department of Meteorology has been directly active in the communications use of space technology, running the Radio and Internet (RANET) program, which allows rural communities to access government internet forecasts through WorldSpace satellite radio [14] from 2001 to 2009. [15]
President Yoweri Museveni has spoken in favor of a regional East African approach to future human spaceflight. [16] [17]
 | This section's factual accuracy is disputed .(May 2013) |
The African Space Research Program is a private volunteer space advocacy group that has pursued a DIY aviation program, with the goal of simulating and preparing for eventual spaceflight. The team was founded by Chris Nsamba after he collaborated on a homebuilt aircraft project in the United States, and resolved to build the first Ugandan-designed homebuilt (the "African Skyhawk") upon his return. Nsamba believes it will be capable of flying at an altitude of 80,000 ft. The aircraft is being put together, with the help of 600 volunteers, in Nsamba's mother's backyard in Ntinda, a suburb of Kampala. [18] [ citation needed ]
The group has also built a "Cadimalla Space Observer", [19] for aerial photography, which they plan to send up with a high-altitude balloon. Jinja Airport is planned to be used for these efforts.
Nsamba, had developed ambitious plans for an eventual spaceplane (the "Dynacraft Spaceship") to send to orbit by 2017, and has also taken on the responsibility of training his volunteers, drawing on his background as a student of astronomy. When asked how he would simulate the effects of zero-gravity, Nsamba said: "I've got a jet engine on order, so I'm planning to build a tunnel, put the engine at one end and when I throw a guy in he'll float in a similar way to how he would in space." [20]
The program has been sustained by donations from around the world, and from 2011, funding has also been supplied by the Ugandan government. A spokesman for the Department of Science and Technology said: "I applaud their ambition ... It provides an opportunity for Africans in general and Ugandans in particular to participate in space science and research instead of being spectators." Flight engineers from the Civil Aviation Authority have been assigned to review and advise the team. [21] However, the head of safety at the Civil Aviation Authority subsequently reported to a Parliamentary science committee that all space activities are illegal in Uganda.
Spaceflight is an application of astronautics to fly objects, usually spacecraft, into or through outer space, either with or without humans on board. Most spaceflight is uncrewed and conducted mainly with spacecraft such as satellites in orbit around Earth, but also includes space probes for flights beyond Earth orbit. Such spaceflight operate either by telerobotic or autonomous control. The more complex human spaceflight has been pursued soon after the first orbital satellites and has reached the Moon and permanent human presence in space around Earth, particularly with the use of space stations. Human spaceflight programs include the Soyuz, Shenzhou, the past Apollo Moon landing and the Space Shuttle programs. Other current spaceflight are conducted to the International Space Station and to China's Tiangong Space Station.
The space program of the People's Republic of China is about the activities in outer space conducted and directed by the People's Republic of China. The roots of the Chinese space program trace back to the 1950s, when, with the help of the newly allied Soviet Union, China began development of its first ballistic missile and rocket programs in response to the perceived American threats. Driven by the successes of Soviet Sputnik 1 and American Explorer 1 satellite launches in 1957 and 1958 respectively, China would launch its first satellite, Dong Fang Hong 1 in April 1970 aboard a Long March 1 rocket, making it the fifth nation to place a satellite in orbit.
A Molniya orbit is a type of satellite orbit designed to provide communications and remote sensing coverage over high latitudes. It is a highly elliptical orbit with an inclination of 63.4 degrees, an argument of perigee of 270 degrees, and an orbital period of approximately half a sidereal day. The name comes from the Molniya satellites, a series of Soviet/Russian civilian and military communications satellites which have used this type of orbit since the mid-1960s.
The Kármán line is a conventional definition of the edge of space. It is not universally accepted. The international record-keeping body FAI defines the Kármán line at an altitude of 100 kilometres above mean sea level.
Space warfare is combat in which one or more belligerents are situated in outer space. The scope of space warfare therefore includes ground-to-space warfare, such as attacking satellites from the Earth; space-to-space warfare, such as satellites attacking satellites; and space-to-ground warfare, such as satellites attacking Earth-based targets. Space warfare in fiction is thus sub-genre and theme of science fiction, where it is portrayed with a range of realism and plausibility. In the real world, international treaties are in place that attempt to regulate conflicts in space and limit the installation of space weapon systems, especially nuclear weapons.
A launch vehicle is typically a rocket-powered vehicle designed to carry a payload 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 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.
Extraterrestrial real estate refers to claims of land ownership on other planets, natural satellites, or parts of space by certain organizations or individuals. Previous claims are not recognized by any authority, and have no legal standing. Nevertheless, some private individuals and organizations have claimed ownership of celestial bodies, such as the Moon, and are actively involved in "selling" parts of them through certificates of ownership termed "Lunar deeds", "Martian deeds" or similar.
The militarisation of space involves the placement and development of weaponry and military technology in outer space. The early exploration of space in the mid-20th century had, in part, a military motivation, as the United States and the Soviet Union used it as an opportunity to demonstrate ballistic-missile technology and other technologies having the potential for military application. Outer space has since been used as an operating location for military spacecraft such as imaging and communications satellites, and some ballistic missiles pass through outer space during their flight. As of 2018, known deployments of weapons stationed in space include only the Almaz space-station armament and pistols such as the TP-82 Cosmonaut survival pistol.
Fēngyún are China's meteorological satellites. Launched since 1988 into polar Sun-synchronous and geosynchronous orbit, each three-axis stabilized Fengyun satellite is built by the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST) and operated by the China Meteorological Administration (CMA). To date, China has launched twenty-one Fengyun satellites in four classes. Fengyun 1 and Fengyun 3 satellites are in polar, Sun-synchronous orbit and Low Earth orbit while Fengyun 2 and 4 are geosynchronous orbit.
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.
Spaceflight began in the 20th century following theoretical and practical breakthroughs by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Robert H. Goddard, and Hermann Oberth, each of whom published works proposing rockets as the means for spaceflight. The first successful large-scale rocket programs were initiated in Nazi Germany by Wernher von Braun. The Soviet Union took the lead in the post-war Space Race, launching the first satellite, the first animal, the first human and the first woman into orbit. The United States would then land the first men on the Moon in 1969. Through the late 20th century, France, the United Kingdom, Japan, and China were also working on projects to reach space.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to space exploration.
On 11 January 2007, China conducted an anti-satellite missile test. A Chinese weather satellite—the FY-1C polar orbit satellite of the Fengyun series, at an altitude of 865 kilometres (537 mi), with a mass of 750 kilograms (1,650 lb)—was destroyed by a kinetic kill vehicle traveling with a speed of 8 km/s (18,000 mph) in the opposite direction. It was launched with a multistage solid-fuel missile from Xichang Satellite Launch Center or nearby.
Space policy is the political decision-making process for, and application of, public policy of a state regarding spaceflight and uses of outer space, both for civilian and military purposes. International treaties, such as the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, attempt to maximize the peaceful uses of space and restrict the militarization of space.
The Declaration of the First Meeting of Equatorial Countries, also known as the Bogota Declaration, is a declaration made and signed in 1976 by eight equatorial countries, and was an attempt to assert sovereignty over those portions of the geostationary orbit that continuously lie over the signatory nations' territory. These claims have been one of the few attempts to challenge the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, but they did not receive wider international support or recognition. Subsequently, they were largely abandoned.
The space policy of the United States includes both the making of space policy through the legislative process, and the implementation of that policy in the United States' civilian and military space programs through regulatory agencies. The early history of United States space policy is linked to the US–Soviet Space Race of the 1960s, which gave way to the Space Shuttle program. At the moment, the US space policy is aimed at the exploration of the Moon and the subsequent colonization of Mars.
The Algerian Space Agency, was established on January 16, 2002 in Bouzareah, Algiers. The agency is in charge of the Algerian space program, and has flown five different satellites.
Kosmos 1188 was a Soviet US-K missile early warning satellite which was launched in 1980 as part of the Soviet military's Oko programme. The satellite was designed to identify missile launches using optical telescopes and infrared sensors. It re-entered on May 24, 2013.
National Aerospace Technology Administration is the official space agency of North Korea, succeeding the Korean Committee of Space Technology (KCST). It was founded on 1 April 2013. Formerly called the National Aerospace Development Administration (NADA), it changed its name in September 2023 following the 9th Session of the 14th Supreme People's Assembly. The current basis for the activities of NATA is the Law on Space Development, passed in 2014 during the 7th session of the 12th Supreme People's Assembly. The act sets out the North Korean principles of the development of space capabilities as it relates to the principles of the North Korean Juche ideology and independence, as well as the aim of solving scientific and technological problems of space exploration to improve its economy, science, and technology.
Tongxin Jishu Shiyan is a Chinese military satellite program operating in geostationary orbit (GEO). TJS satellites are manufactured by the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST) and launched from Xichang Satellite Launch Center (XSLC) in China's southern Sichuan Province. TJS is likely the cover name for multiple geostationary military satellite programs and should not be confused with the similarly named Shiyan satellite program.
..Grenada's proposed UFO agency came to a vote, out of the other 148 members of the UN, only one voted with Grenada - Idi Amin's Uganda
Space research in Africa | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Space agencies |
| ||||
| Initiatives | |||||
| Observatories | |||||
| Astronomy | |||||
