# Arnhem Space Centre

12°22′53″S 136°48′50″E﻿ / ﻿12.38139°S 136.81389°E﻿ / -12.38139; 136.81389
The Arnhem Space Centre is a commercial spaceport near Nhulunbuy, in Arnhem Land, Australia. The facility is owned and operated by Equatorial Launch Australia, both of which were founded by Scott Wallis in 2016. ASC was the location of NASA's first non-orbital sounding rocket launch from a commercial spaceport outside the United States, which took place on 27 June 2022.

## Background

The project took six years to develop, and the small team worked from Canberra to obtain a lease, sign the NASA contract and design the site. It was announced publicly in 2019.

## Description

The spaceport is located near Nhulunbuy, a township on the Gove Peninsula in north-east Arnhem Land, in the Northern Territory. The ASC is owned and operated by Equatorial Launch Australia (ELA), which has its head office in Adelaide, South Australia.
Arnhem Space Centre is equipped to launch both sub-orbital flights and small orbital flights. The site's location, only 12 degrees south of the equator, is preferable for orbital rockets launching east, as extra speed is provided due to the spin of Earth. It is the first commercial spaceport in Australia, and as of July 2022 the only one. Scott Wallis, the founder, was a flight test navigator with the Royal Australian Airforce and had experience developing spaceports. His understanding of sub orbital rocketry led him to believe that substantial fuel can be saved by launching from as close to the equator as possible.

## Launches

On 26 June 2022, the American space agency NASA used the site for its first launch from a commercial port outside the United States. The rocket was a Black Brant IX carrying a X-ray Quantum Calorimeter (XQC) instrument for UW–Madison for the purpose of X-ray astronomy for a brief period ( 5-20 min) in space. The mission was a suborbital flight with apogee of 203 mi (327 km). It was the first launch of a suborbital sounding rocket from Arnhem Space Centre in north-east Arnhem Land. The mission was successful.
A second launch was scheduled for 4 July but was delayed until 6 July 11:17pm ACST due to weather conditions. The spacecraft, named Sistine III, was sent by NASA to investigate the properties of astronomical transits of nearby exoplanets.
The third launch took place on 11 July 2022 at 8:31pm ACST, carrying the fourth DEUCE mission, intended by NASA to investigate and analyze the Alpha Centauri star system's ultraviolet spectrum.
As of July 2022 the long term future of the site was not known, but Equatorial Launch Australia had indicated that there are other space companies interested in using the rocket launch pad, and NASA has confirmed that it will use the facility again in the future.
In August 2023, ELA announced that there would be launches by early 2025 by INNOSPACE of South Korea.

## Collaboration with Phantom

In 2023 ELA signed an agreement Phantom Space Corporation, a US rocket company, to collaborate on missions at ASC. Phantom has links to the US Department of Defense, and an ELA spokesperson said that the launch site could one day be used for missile-testing and development. Phantom hopes to mass-produce rockets, which could be fired from the ASC site by 2025. While the main focus is on commercial uses, the potential for involvement in military use has raised concerns among the local community.