Interesting times, these. Recently there's been some buzz about the Alcantara spaceport "opening up" to American boosters. Certain Presidents (plural) are praising the concept, certain legacy American rocket manufacturers are investigating the opportunity.
Notably, SpaceX is not interested in dragging their junk to another continent and then out into the middle of the jungle, which of course makes a lot of sense...at least to those of us not trying to score political points with our base.
Can the U.S. Save Alcantara, Brazil’s Cursed Spaceport?
Interestingly, Vector is in the conversation, and Brazil could actually make sense for them. While there's next to no value in an equatorial location for a launcher that small, there's got to be leveragable knowledge down there on how to build and operate a launch site that Vector would otherwise have to develop in-house. More importantly though, there's no doubt a bucket of subsidies from Bolsonaro....
Notably, SpaceX is not interested in dragging their junk to another continent and then out into the middle of the jungle, which of course makes a lot of sense...at least to those of us not trying to score political points with our base.
Can the U.S. Save Alcantara, Brazil’s Cursed Spaceport?
Interestingly, Vector is in the conversation, and Brazil could actually make sense for them. While there's next to no value in an equatorial location for a launcher that small, there's got to be leveragable knowledge down there on how to build and operate a launch site that Vector would otherwise have to develop in-house. More importantly though, there's no doubt a bucket of subsidies from Bolsonaro....
