Satellite Love

I was born a week before Sputnik, the first satellite, was launched. The night I came home from hospital my parents sat on the verandah and watched it fly overhead.

 I've had a bit of a thing about satellites ever  since.






So it was off to Tsukuba in Ibaraki Prefecture to visit the National Space Centre. Tsukuba is a manufactured city and is the tech-hub city of Japan. It houses, apart from the Space Agency, many startups, technology firms and research facilities and universities.

It is basically in the middle of nowhere and was built from scratch, its a bit like Canberra but without the fun and excitement. Every building looks like a suburban dental clinic or hospital.

I'm being a little unfair, as like Canberra, there are good things around it. Mt Tsukuba rises out of the Ibaraki plain and at its foot are some truly splendid old samurai houses.


But the Space Centre is marvellous. its full of satellites and rocket engines and there is a real, massive rocket in the carpark, every car park should have one.

A surprising thing was the sheer size of the space station modules. One always thinks of poor astronauts crammed into impossibly small tin can arrangements but the space station is positively roomy.

Also the size of some of the new satellites is astonishing.

 

 

 

A rocket engine looking like a rather nice modern sculpture.

This is Hayabusa, a personal favourite. It circled an asteroid, landed on it, took a sample amd then returned to earth. It parachuted down at Woomera in South Australia.