When people entering the space business say things like this, you have to wonder. It’s nonsense.
So much twaddle has been written about the potential of the UK launch programme, not least by the space cadet twitterati.
One half-informed thread on the inevitable all-conquering greatness of horizontal launch ends with “EMPIRE 2.0!” & not in jest 🙄
Get real, folks.
@markmccaughrean To simply accept a statement presented as fact from someone with a vested interest is lazy reporting.
@grandmaBates It’s just wrong to boot. While launches into equatorial orbits benefit from the boost given by Earth’s rotation if launched east (& the closer to the equator, the better, hence French Guiana & Florida), there’s no such gain to be had launching into a polar orbit. It doesn’t matter where you launch from in terms of latitude, as long as you have open sea to the north or south for safety. That’s why Scotland has been chosen, plus its remoteness from population centres.
@markmccaughrean Can you elaborate on this? It would seem that if you launch from the equator and want to hit a polar orbit, you have to not only get up to orbital velocity in the north or south direction, but also get 460m/s worth of westward delta V to shed the initial eastward velocity you had from the earth's rotation. If you didn't do this, you wouldn't be aimed directly at the pole in the inertial frame.
There's probably something I'm missing, so I'm happy to be corrected here.
@khird @grandmaBates To go into a strictly polar orbit at 90º inclination, passing over the poles, yes, there's penalty to be paid the closer you are to the equator. But it's small relative to the orbital delta-v, given the way the vectors add, & if you're happy to be "almost polar" (>60º counts as polar), then it's essentially irrelevant.