Blue Streak missile
Encyclopedia
The Blue Streak missile was a British medium range ballistic missile
(MRBM). The Operational Requirement for the missile was issued in 1955 and the design was complete by 1957. The project was intended to ensure that there was a credible replacement for the V Bomber
aircraft which would become obsolete by 1965.
The cancellation of Blue Streak as a military weapon was announced in 1960. Partly to avoid political embarrassment from the cancellation, the Government proposed that the rocket be used as the first stage of a satellite launcher. However, the cost was thought to be too great for the UK alone, and European collaboration was sought. This led to the formation of the European Launcher Development Organisation (ELDO), with Blue Streak used as the first stage. The second stage was provided by the French, and the third stage by the Germans. The test satellite and fairings were provided by the Italians, and the Dutch and Belgians were responsible for telemetry and ground stations. Australia provided the launch site at Woomera. The complete vehicle was known as Europa
. It was tested at Woomera test range
, Australia, and Kourou in French Guiana. Europa was cancelled in 1972 and ELDO was dissolved.
Britain's nuclear weapon
s armament was initially based on free-fall bombs delivered by the V bomber
force. It soon became clear that if Britain wanted to have a credible threat, a ballistic missile was essential. There was a political need for an independent deterrent, so that Britain could remain a major world power. Britain was unable to purchase American weapons wholesale due to the restrictions of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946
.
In April 1954 the Americans proposed a joint development programme for ballistic missiles. The United States would develop an intercontinental ballistic missile
(ICBM) of 5000 nautical miles (9,260 km) range, while the United Kingdom with United States support would develop a medium-range ballistic missile
(MRBM) of 2000 nautical miles (3,704 km) range. The proposal was accepted as part of the Wilson-Sandys Agreement of August 1954, which provided for collaboration, exchange of information, and mutual planning of development programmes. The decision to develop was influenced by what could be learnt about missile design and development in the US. Initial requirements for the booster were made by the Royal Aircraft Establishment
at Farnborough
with input on the rocket engine design from the Rocket Propulsion Establishment
at Westcott
. British Operational Requirement 1139 demanded a rocket of at least 1500 n.m. and the initially proposed rocket would have just reached that threshold.
De Havilland
won the contract to build the missile, which was to be powered by an uprated liquid-fuelled Rocketdyne
S3D engine, developed by Rolls-Royce
, called RZ2
. Two variants of this engine were developed: the first provided a static thrust of 137000 lb (62,142.2 kg) and the second (intended for the three stage satellite launch vehicle) 150000 lb (68,038.9 kg). The engines were unique at that time in that they could be vectored by seven degrees in flight and could therefore be used to guide the vehicle. This configuration, however, put considerable pressure on the autopilot which had to cope with the problem of a vehicle whose weight was diminishing rapidly and that was steered by large engines whose thrust remained more or less constant. The vibration was also a problem, particularly at engine cut-off, and the later development of the autopilot for the satellite launcher was, in itself, a considerable achievement.
Subcontractors included the Sperry Gyroscope Company who produced the guidance system whilst the warhead itself was designed by the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston
.
Doubts arose as the cost escalated from the first tentative figure of £50m submitted to the Treasury
in early 1955, to £300m in late 1959. Its detractors in the civil service claimed that the programme was crawling along when compared with the speed of development in the US and the Soviet Union
. Estimates within the Civil Service for completion of the project ranged from a total spend of £550 Million to £1,300 Million, as different ministers were set on either abandoning or continuing the project.
ally Australia, which had its own vested interest in the project.
The missiles used liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants. Whilst the vehicle could be left fully laden with 20+ tonnes of kerosene, the 60 tonnes of liquid oxygen had to be loaded immediately before launch or icing became a problem. Due to this, fuelling the rocket took 4.5 minutes, which would have made it useless as a rapid response to an attack. The missile was vulnerable to a pre-emptive attack, launched without warning or in the absence of any heightening of tension sufficient to warrant readying the missile, if such a circumstance were ever likely. To negate this problem DeHavilland created a stand-by feature. A missile could be held at 30 seconds' notice to launch for ten hours. As the missiles were to be deployed in pairs and it took ten hours for one missile to be prepared for stand-by, one of the two missiles could always be ready for rapid launch.
To protect the missiles against a pre-emptive strike while being fuelled, the idea of siting the missiles in underground silos was developed. These would have been designed to withstand a one megaton
blast at a distance of half a mile (800 m) and were a British innovation, subsequently exported to the US. However, finding sites for these silos proved extremely difficult and RAF Spadeadam
in Cumbria
was the only site where construction was undertaken. This was also the site where the RZ2 rocket engines and also the complete Blue Streak missile were tested. The best sites for silo construction were the more stable rock strata in parts of southern England, but the construction of many underground silos in the countryside carried enormous economic, social, and political cost.
As no site in Britain provided enough space for test flights, a test site was established at Woomera, South Australia
. Whitehall opposition to the project grew, and it was eventually cancelled on the ostensible grounds that it would be too vulnerable to a first-strike attack. Admiral of the Fleet Lord Mountbatten of Burma
had spent considerable effort arguing that the project should be cancelled at once in favour of his Navy being armed with nuclear weapons, capable of pre-emptive strike.
The British government transferred its hopes to the Anglo-American Skybolt missile, before the project's cancellation by the USA as its ICBM program reached maturity. The British instead purchased the Polaris system from the Americans, carried in British-built submarine
s.
test vehicle, and the orbital injection stage was a small hydrogen peroxide/kerosene motor. This launcher never progressed beyond the design stage.
This also proved too expensive, and the European Launcher Development Organisation
(ELDO) was set up. This used Blue Streak as the first stage, with French and German second and third stages. The Blue Streak first stage was successfully tested three times at the Woomera test range in Australia as part of the ELDO programme.
Although a total of eight launches were made of the multi-stage vehicle, the French and German components proved unreliable leading to the project's final cancellation, and the end of Blue Streak. The final launch was made at the French site of Kourou
in French Guiana
.
The full launch history of Blue Streak is as follows,
(Taken from the "Europa SLV Historiograph", produced by HSD Ltd):
based on Blue Streak., however, none of these were ever built in full and today only exist in design. The Blue Streak was eventually tested as the first stage of the Europa rocket
, designed by the European Launcher Development Organisation
, although this too ended in failure due to lack of funds, despite the fact that Blue Streak itself worked almost perfectly. Most, although not all, designs were based on using Blue Streak as a first stage, and a usually modified Black Knight
as a second stage.
. This was at a time before either rocket had even been tested. Payloads were estimated to be around 1,034 kg
(2,280 lb
) to a 370 km (200 nmi) orbit and 960 kg (2,117 lb) to a 740 km (400 nmi) orbit. However, the design was considered to be inefficient and difficult because of the large differences in the diameters of the 3 metre (10 ft) wide Blue Streak and the metre-wide (3 ft) Black Knight. Fitting satellites into a three foot payload fairing
could also have been a challenge. Nevertheless, these difficulties were also encountered with successful American rockets including the Thor and Atlas.
upper stage. The Centaur second stage would have either been built in the UK under licence or imported directly from the USA. Both the Centaur and Blue Streak had proved to be very reliable up to this point, and since they were both already designed development costs would have been low. Furthermore, it had a payload of 870–920 kg to a geosynchronous orbit with, and 650–700 kg without the use of additional booster rockets.
There were some problems with the design, however. The relative power of the rocket reduced with altitude. The solution requested by the government and provided by Saunders Roe was to use a high-energy cryogenic upper stage which would increase the payload to 408 kg (900 lb) to a 9,260 km (5,0 nmi (0 km)i) orbit, and 272 kg (600 lb) to a 16,670 km (9,0 nmi (0 km)i) orbit. The cost of developing the upper stage stage was estimated to be £
5-7 million.
It was planned that Black Prince would be a Commonwealth
project. However, since the government of John Diefenbaker
in Canada was already spending more money than publicly acknowledged on Alouette
and Australia was not interested in the project, these two countries were unwilling to contribute. South Africa was no longer a member of the Commonwealth. New Zealand was only likely to make "modest" contributions.
France, however, showed an interest, although they were suspected of trying to gain technical information for their own missile programmes. Despite this, Saunders Roe continued to design new configurations even after the formal cancellation of the Black Prince programme.
A section of the propulsion bay, engines and equipment can be found at the Solway Aviation Museum
, Carlisle Lake District Airport. Only a few miles from the Spadeadam testing site, the museum carries many exhibits, photographs and models of the Blue Streak programme having inherited the original Spadeadam collection that used to be displayed on site.
An RZ2
engine is on display at Armagh Planetarium
, Northern Ireland
and The Euro Space Center
in Redu
, Belgium.
Footage from the Blue Streak launch was briefly incorporated into The Prisoner
s final episode, "Fall Out
". A part of the Blue Streak rocket launched on 5 June 1964 from Woomera
, Australia, found 50 km SE of Giles in 1980 is on display at Giles Weather Station
. Another piece was located in 2006 but its exact location has been kept secret by the finders. The titanium structure of a German third stage was, for some time, sited on the edge of a gravel pit in Gloucestershire.
Ballistic missile
A ballistic missile is a missile that follows a sub-orbital ballistic flightpath with the objective of delivering one or more warheads to a predetermined target. The missile is only guided during the relatively brief initial powered phase of flight and its course is subsequently governed by the...
(MRBM). The Operational Requirement for the missile was issued in 1955 and the design was complete by 1957. The project was intended to ensure that there was a credible replacement for the V Bomber
V bomber
The term V bomber was used for the Royal Air Force aircraft during the 1950s and 1960s that comprised the United Kingdom's strategic nuclear strike force known officially as the V-force or Bomber Command Main Force...
aircraft which would become obsolete by 1965.
The cancellation of Blue Streak as a military weapon was announced in 1960. Partly to avoid political embarrassment from the cancellation, the Government proposed that the rocket be used as the first stage of a satellite launcher. However, the cost was thought to be too great for the UK alone, and European collaboration was sought. This led to the formation of the European Launcher Development Organisation (ELDO), with Blue Streak used as the first stage. The second stage was provided by the French, and the third stage by the Germans. The test satellite and fairings were provided by the Italians, and the Dutch and Belgians were responsible for telemetry and ground stations. Australia provided the launch site at Woomera. The complete vehicle was known as Europa
Europa rocket
The Europa rocket was an early expendable launch system of the European Launcher Development Organisation , which was the precursor to the European Space Agency and its Ariane family of launchers. Europa was built develop space accsess technology and put a European-wide telecommunication and...
. It was tested at Woomera test range
Woomera, South Australia
The town, or village, of Woomera is located in the south east corner of the Woomera Prohibited Area ; colloquially known as the Woomera Rocket Range...
, Australia, and Kourou in French Guiana. Europa was cancelled in 1972 and ELDO was dissolved.
Background
Post-warWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
Britain's nuclear weapon
Nuclear weapon
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission or a combination of fission and fusion. Both reactions release vast quantities of energy from relatively small amounts of matter. The first fission bomb test released the same amount...
s armament was initially based on free-fall bombs delivered by the V bomber
V bomber
The term V bomber was used for the Royal Air Force aircraft during the 1950s and 1960s that comprised the United Kingdom's strategic nuclear strike force known officially as the V-force or Bomber Command Main Force...
force. It soon became clear that if Britain wanted to have a credible threat, a ballistic missile was essential. There was a political need for an independent deterrent, so that Britain could remain a major world power. Britain was unable to purchase American weapons wholesale due to the restrictions of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946
Atomic Energy Act of 1946
The Atomic Energy Act of 1946 determined how the United States federal government would control and manage the nuclear technology it had jointly developed with its wartime allies...
.
In April 1954 the Americans proposed a joint development programme for ballistic missiles. The United States would develop an intercontinental ballistic missile
Intercontinental ballistic missile
An intercontinental ballistic missile is a ballistic missile with a long range typically designed for nuclear weapons delivery...
(ICBM) of 5000 nautical miles (9,260 km) range, while the United Kingdom with United States support would develop a medium-range ballistic missile
Medium-range ballistic missile
A medium-range ballistic missile , is a type of ballistic missile with medium range, this last classification depending on the standards of certain organizations. Within the U.S. Department of Defense, a medium range missile is defined by having a maximum range of between 1,000 and 3,000 km1...
(MRBM) of 2000 nautical miles (3,704 km) range. The proposal was accepted as part of the Wilson-Sandys Agreement of August 1954, which provided for collaboration, exchange of information, and mutual planning of development programmes. The decision to develop was influenced by what could be learnt about missile design and development in the US. Initial requirements for the booster were made by the Royal Aircraft Establishment
Royal Aircraft Establishment
The Royal Aircraft Establishment , was a British research establishment, known by several different names during its history, that eventually came under the aegis of the UK Ministry of Defence , before finally losing its identity in mergers with other institutions.The first site was at Farnborough...
at Farnborough
Farnborough, Hampshire
-History:Name changes: Ferneberga ; Farnburghe, Farenberg ; Farnborowe, Fremborough, Fameborough .Tower Hill, Cove: There is substantial evidence...
with input on the rocket engine design from the Rocket Propulsion Establishment
Rocket Propulsion Establishment
The Rocket Propulsion Establishment at Westcott, Buckinghamshire on the site of the former RAF Westcott has made a number of notable contributions in the field of rocket propulsion, including input on the rocket design for the Blue Streak missile and the propulsion systems on Chevaline...
at Westcott
Westcott, Buckinghamshire
Westcott is a village and also a civil parish within Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England. It is located about a mile west of Waddesdon.The village name is Anglo Saxon in origin, and means 'west cottage'....
. British Operational Requirement 1139 demanded a rocket of at least 1500 n.m. and the initially proposed rocket would have just reached that threshold.
De Havilland
De Havilland
The de Havilland Aircraft Company was a British aviation manufacturer founded in 1920 when Airco, of which Geoffrey de Havilland had been chief designer, was sold to BSA by the owner George Holt Thomas. De Havilland then set up a company under his name in September of that year at Stag Lane...
won the contract to build the missile, which was to be powered by an uprated liquid-fuelled Rocketdyne
Rocketdyne
Rocketdyne was a Rocket engine design and production company headquartered in Canoga Park, California, United States. The company was related to North American Aviation for most of its history. NAA merged with Rockwell International, which was then bought by Boeing in December, 1996...
S3D engine, developed by Rolls-Royce
Rolls-Royce Limited
Rolls-Royce Limited was a renowned British car and, from 1914 on, aero-engine manufacturing company founded by Charles Stewart Rolls and Henry Royce on 15 March 1906 as the result of a partnership formed in 1904....
, called RZ2
RZ2
thumb|right|RZ2 at [[Armagh Planetarium]]The RZ2 was a British design for a LOX / kerosene liquid fuel rocket engine to power the Blue Streak missile....
. Two variants of this engine were developed: the first provided a static thrust of 137000 lb (62,142.2 kg) and the second (intended for the three stage satellite launch vehicle) 150000 lb (68,038.9 kg). The engines were unique at that time in that they could be vectored by seven degrees in flight and could therefore be used to guide the vehicle. This configuration, however, put considerable pressure on the autopilot which had to cope with the problem of a vehicle whose weight was diminishing rapidly and that was steered by large engines whose thrust remained more or less constant. The vibration was also a problem, particularly at engine cut-off, and the later development of the autopilot for the satellite launcher was, in itself, a considerable achievement.
Subcontractors included the Sperry Gyroscope Company who produced the guidance system whilst the warhead itself was designed by the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston
Aldermaston
Aldermaston is a rural village, civil parish and electoral ward in Berkshire, South-East England. In the 2001 United Kingdom Census, the parish had a population of 927. The village is on the southern edge of the River Kennet flood plain, near the Hampshire county boundary...
.
Doubts arose as the cost escalated from the first tentative figure of £50m submitted to the Treasury
HM Treasury
HM Treasury, in full Her Majesty's Treasury, informally The Treasury, is the United Kingdom government department responsible for developing and executing the British government's public finance policy and economic policy...
in early 1955, to £300m in late 1959. Its detractors in the civil service claimed that the programme was crawling along when compared with the speed of development in the US and the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
. Estimates within the Civil Service for completion of the project ranged from a total spend of £550 Million to £1,300 Million, as different ministers were set on either abandoning or continuing the project.
Cancellation
Eventually the project was cancelled in 1960- although debates had been ongoing within government since 1958. Some considered the cancellation of Blue Streak to be not only a blow to British military-industrial efforts, but also to CommonwealthCommonwealth of Nations
The Commonwealth of Nations, normally referred to as the Commonwealth and formerly known as the British Commonwealth, is an intergovernmental organisation of fifty-four independent member states...
ally Australia, which had its own vested interest in the project.
The missiles used liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants. Whilst the vehicle could be left fully laden with 20+ tonnes of kerosene, the 60 tonnes of liquid oxygen had to be loaded immediately before launch or icing became a problem. Due to this, fuelling the rocket took 4.5 minutes, which would have made it useless as a rapid response to an attack. The missile was vulnerable to a pre-emptive attack, launched without warning or in the absence of any heightening of tension sufficient to warrant readying the missile, if such a circumstance were ever likely. To negate this problem DeHavilland created a stand-by feature. A missile could be held at 30 seconds' notice to launch for ten hours. As the missiles were to be deployed in pairs and it took ten hours for one missile to be prepared for stand-by, one of the two missiles could always be ready for rapid launch.
To protect the missiles against a pre-emptive strike while being fuelled, the idea of siting the missiles in underground silos was developed. These would have been designed to withstand a one megaton
TNT equivalent
TNT equivalent is a method of quantifying the energy released in explosions. The ton of TNT is a unit of energy equal to 4.184 gigajoules, which is approximately the amount of energy released in the detonation of one ton of TNT...
blast at a distance of half a mile (800 m) and were a British innovation, subsequently exported to the US. However, finding sites for these silos proved extremely difficult and RAF Spadeadam
RAF Spadeadam
RAF Spadeadam is a Royal Air Force station in Cumbria, England close to the border with Northumberland. It is the home of the 9000 acre Electronic Warfare Tactics Range, making it the largest RAF base in the United Kingdom.-History:...
in Cumbria
Cumbria
Cumbria , is a non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local authority, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's largest settlement and county town is Carlisle. It consists of six districts, and in...
was the only site where construction was undertaken. This was also the site where the RZ2 rocket engines and also the complete Blue Streak missile were tested. The best sites for silo construction were the more stable rock strata in parts of southern England, but the construction of many underground silos in the countryside carried enormous economic, social, and political cost.
As no site in Britain provided enough space for test flights, a test site was established at Woomera, South Australia
Woomera, South Australia
The town, or village, of Woomera is located in the south east corner of the Woomera Prohibited Area ; colloquially known as the Woomera Rocket Range...
. Whitehall opposition to the project grew, and it was eventually cancelled on the ostensible grounds that it would be too vulnerable to a first-strike attack. Admiral of the Fleet Lord Mountbatten of Burma
Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma
Admiral of the Fleet Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas George Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, KG, GCB, OM, GCSI, GCIE, GCVO, DSO, PC, FRS , was a British statesman and naval officer, and an uncle of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh...
had spent considerable effort arguing that the project should be cancelled at once in favour of his Navy being armed with nuclear weapons, capable of pre-emptive strike.
The British government transferred its hopes to the Anglo-American Skybolt missile, before the project's cancellation by the USA as its ICBM program reached maturity. The British instead purchased the Polaris system from the Americans, carried in British-built submarine
Submarine
A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...
s.
Civilian programme
After the cancellation as a military project, there was reluctance to cancel the project because of the huge cost incurred. Blue Streak would have become the first stage of a projected all British satellite launcher known as "Black Prince": the second stage was derived from the Black KnightBlack Knight (rocket)
Black Knight was a British launch vehicle to test and verify the design of a re-entry vehicle for the Blue Streak missile.The United Kingdom's first indigenous rocketry project, Black Knight was manufactured by Saunders-Roe on the Isle of Wight, had its engines tested at The Needles and was...
test vehicle, and the orbital injection stage was a small hydrogen peroxide/kerosene motor. This launcher never progressed beyond the design stage.
This also proved too expensive, and the European Launcher Development Organisation
European Launcher Development Organisation
The European Launcher Development Organisation was a multinational consortium formed in the 1960s to build an indigenous European space launch vehicle, Europa....
(ELDO) was set up. This used Blue Streak as the first stage, with French and German second and third stages. The Blue Streak first stage was successfully tested three times at the Woomera test range in Australia as part of the ELDO programme.
Although a total of eight launches were made of the multi-stage vehicle, the French and German components proved unreliable leading to the project's final cancellation, and the end of Blue Streak. The final launch was made at the French site of Kourou
Kourou
Kourou is a commune in French Guiana, an overseas region and department of France located in South America.Kourou is the location of the Guiana Space Centre, France and ESA's main spaceport.-Geography:...
in French Guiana
French Guiana
French Guiana is an overseas region of France, consisting of a single overseas department located on the northern Atlantic coast of South America. It has borders with two nations, Brazil to the east and south, and Suriname to the west...
.
The full launch history of Blue Streak is as follows,
(Taken from the "Europa SLV Historiograph", produced by HSD Ltd):
| Flight No. | Second stage (Corali) | Third stage (Astris) | Payload | Launch date | Mission notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| F1 | n/a | n/a | n/a | 5 June 1964 | uncontrollable oscillations during final phase of burn due to fuel sloshing in tanks |
| F2 | n/a | n/a | n/a | 21 October 1964 | Successful flight |
| F3 | n/a | n/a | n/a | 23 March 1965 | Successful flight |
| F4 | untested | untested | untested | 24 May 1966 | Successful flight |
| F5 | untested | untested | untested | 15 November 1966 | Successful flight |
| F6.1 | failed | untested | untested | 4 June 1967 | 2nd stage failed to ignite |
| F6.2 | failed | failed | failed | 6 December 1967 | 2nd stage failed to separate |
| F7 | successful | failed | failed | 29 November 1968 | 3rd stage failure after separation |
| F8 | successful | failed | failed | 3 July 1969 | 3rd stage failure after separation |
| F9 | successful | successful | failed | 24 June 1970 | Fairing failed to separate |
| F11 | successful | successful | failed | 5 November 1970 | Guidance system failed |
| F12 | untested | untested | untested | n/a | Delivered to French Guiana |
| F13 | untested | untested | untested | n/a | Delivered to National Museum of Flight, near Edinburgh Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area... |
| F14 | untested | untested | untested | n/a | Delivered to Deutsches Museum, Munich Munich Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat... |
| F15 | untested | untested | untested | n/a | Delivered to Euro Space Center, Redu, Belgium |
| F16 | untested | untested | untested | n/a | On display at NSC Leicester, on loan from Liverpool Museums |
| F17 | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a | Parts only completed |
| F18 | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a | Parts only completed |
Related projects
A range of proposals was made between 1957 and 1972 for a carrier rocketLaunch vehicle
In spaceflight, a launch vehicle or carrier rocket is a rocket used to carry a payload from the Earth's surface into outer space. A launch system includes the launch vehicle, the launch pad and other infrastructure....
based on Blue Streak., however, none of these were ever built in full and today only exist in design. The Blue Streak was eventually tested as the first stage of the Europa rocket
Europa rocket
The Europa rocket was an early expendable launch system of the European Launcher Development Organisation , which was the precursor to the European Space Agency and its Ariane family of launchers. Europa was built develop space accsess technology and put a European-wide telecommunication and...
, designed by the European Launcher Development Organisation
European Launcher Development Organisation
The European Launcher Development Organisation was a multinational consortium formed in the 1960s to build an indigenous European space launch vehicle, Europa....
, although this too ended in failure due to lack of funds, despite the fact that Blue Streak itself worked almost perfectly. Most, although not all, designs were based on using Blue Streak as a first stage, and a usually modified Black Knight
Black Knight (rocket)
Black Knight was a British launch vehicle to test and verify the design of a re-entry vehicle for the Blue Streak missile.The United Kingdom's first indigenous rocketry project, Black Knight was manufactured by Saunders-Roe on the Isle of Wight, had its engines tested at The Needles and was...
as a second stage.
1957 proposal
In 1957 a carrier rocket based on a combination of Blue Streak and Black Knight was proposed by Desmond King Hele and Doreen Gilmour of the Royal Aircraft EstablishmentRoyal Aircraft Establishment
The Royal Aircraft Establishment , was a British research establishment, known by several different names during its history, that eventually came under the aegis of the UK Ministry of Defence , before finally losing its identity in mergers with other institutions.The first site was at Farnborough...
. This was at a time before either rocket had even been tested. Payloads were estimated to be around 1,034 kg
Kilogram
The kilogram or kilogramme , also known as the kilo, is the base unit of mass in the International System of Units and is defined as being equal to the mass of the International Prototype Kilogram , which is almost exactly equal to the mass of one liter of water...
(2,280 lb
Pound (mass)
The pound or pound-mass is a unit of mass used in the Imperial, United States customary and other systems of measurement...
) to a 370 km (200 nmi) orbit and 960 kg (2,117 lb) to a 740 km (400 nmi) orbit. However, the design was considered to be inefficient and difficult because of the large differences in the diameters of the 3 metre (10 ft) wide Blue Streak and the metre-wide (3 ft) Black Knight. Fitting satellites into a three foot payload fairing
Payload fairing
Payload fairing is one of the main components of a launch vehicle. The fairing protects the payload during the ascent against the impact of the atmosphere . More recently, an additional function is to maintain the cleanroom environment for precision instruments.Outside the atmosphere the fairing is...
could also have been a challenge. Nevertheless, these difficulties were also encountered with successful American rockets including the Thor and Atlas.
1972 proposal
In 1972, HSD (Hawker Siddeley Dynamics) produced a brochure for a design using Blue Streak as the first stage of a two-stage to orbit rocket, with an American CentaurCentaur (rocket stage)
Centaur is a rocket stage designed for use as the upper stage of space launch vehicles. Centaur boosts its satellite payload to geosynchronous orbit or, in the case of an interplanetary space probe, to or near to escape velocity...
upper stage. The Centaur second stage would have either been built in the UK under licence or imported directly from the USA. Both the Centaur and Blue Streak had proved to be very reliable up to this point, and since they were both already designed development costs would have been low. Furthermore, it had a payload of 870–920 kg to a geosynchronous orbit with, and 650–700 kg without the use of additional booster rockets.
De Havilland/British Interplanetary Society proposal
In 1959 de Havilland suggested solving the problem of the Blue Streak/Black Knight geometry by compressing the 10 by 1 metre (30 by 3 foot) Black Knight into a 10 feet (3 m) sphere. Although this seemed logical, the development costs proved to be too high for the limited budget of the programme.Black Prince
In 1959, a year before the cancellation of the Blue Streak as a missile, the government requested that the RAE and Saunders Roe design a carrier rocket based on Blue Streak and Black Knight. This design used Blue Streak as a first stage and a 54 inch (137 centimetre) second stage based on the Black Knight. Several different third stages would be available, depending on the required payload and orbit. Examples of orbits suggested by Saunders Roe and the RAE were a 556 km (300 nmi) orbit for 'experiments in stellar UV spectroscopy', a 556-1,296 km (300-700 nmi (1,296.4 km)i) orbit for 'enabling investigations of the Earth's radiation belts,' and a 556-185,200 km (300-100000 nmi (185,200 km)i) orbit for a 'Space probe.'There were some problems with the design, however. The relative power of the rocket reduced with altitude. The solution requested by the government and provided by Saunders Roe was to use a high-energy cryogenic upper stage which would increase the payload to 408 kg (900 lb) to a 9,260 km (5,0 nmi (0 km)i) orbit, and 272 kg (600 lb) to a 16,670 km (9,0 nmi (0 km)i) orbit. The cost of developing the upper stage stage was estimated to be £
Pound sterling
The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...
5-7 million.
It was planned that Black Prince would be a Commonwealth
Commonwealth of Nations
The Commonwealth of Nations, normally referred to as the Commonwealth and formerly known as the British Commonwealth, is an intergovernmental organisation of fifty-four independent member states...
project. However, since the government of John Diefenbaker
John Diefenbaker
John George Diefenbaker, PC, CH, QC was the 13th Prime Minister of Canada, serving from June 21, 1957, to April 22, 1963...
in Canada was already spending more money than publicly acknowledged on Alouette
Alouette 1
Alouette 1 was Canada's first satellite, and the first satellite constructed by a country other than the USSR or the United States. Occasionally, Alouette 1 is misrepresented as the third satellite successfully put in orbit, rather than being from the third country to have one of its own in space,...
and Australia was not interested in the project, these two countries were unwilling to contribute. South Africa was no longer a member of the Commonwealth. New Zealand was only likely to make "modest" contributions.
France, however, showed an interest, although they were suspected of trying to gain technical information for their own missile programmes. Despite this, Saunders Roe continued to design new configurations even after the formal cancellation of the Black Prince programme.
Blue Streak today
Following the cancellation of the Blue Streak project some of the remaining rockets were preserved at:- The National Space CentreNational Space CentreThe National Space Centre is one of the United Kingdom's leading visitor attractions that is devoted to space science and astronomy. It is located in the city of Leicester, England, next to the River Soar on the A6.-History:...
in LeicesterLeicesterLeicester is a city and unitary authority in the East Midlands of England, and the county town of Leicestershire. The city lies on the River Soar and at the edge of the National Forest...
, England. - The Deutsches MuseumDeutsches MuseumThe Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany, is the world's largest museum of technology and science, with approximately 1.5 million visitors per year and about 28,000 exhibited objects from 50 fields of science and technology. The museum was founded on June 28, 1903, at a meeting of the Association...
at OberschleißheimOberschleißheimOberschleißheim is a municipality in the district of Munich, in Bavaria, Germany. It is located 13 km north of Munich . As of 2005 it had a population of 11,467....
near MunichMunichMunich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat... - The National Museum of Flight in East FortuneEast FortuneEast Fortune is a village in East Lothian, Scotland, located 2 miles north west of East Linton. The area is known for its airfield which was constructed in 1915 to help protect Britain from attack by German Zeppelin airships during the First World War. The RNAS airship station also included an...
, Scotland. - The Euro Space CenterEuro Space CenterEuro Space Center is an educational tourist attraction located in Transinne, Belgium, near Redu, devoted to space and astronautics. The centre includes simulators of space flight and micro-gravity...
in ReduReduRedu is a village in the municipality of Libin, in Luxembourg province, Belgium. The village is twinned with Hay-on-Wye in the United Kingdom and it is one of the very first book towns....
, Belgium.
A section of the propulsion bay, engines and equipment can be found at the Solway Aviation Museum
Solway Aviation Museum
The Solway Aviation Museum is an independently run aircraft museum located at Carlisle Lake District Airport in Cumbria.-About the Museum:The Museum is run by The Solway Aviation Society and staffed by unpaid volunteers. It is a registered charity supported by entrance charges to the Museum, and...
, Carlisle Lake District Airport. Only a few miles from the Spadeadam testing site, the museum carries many exhibits, photographs and models of the Blue Streak programme having inherited the original Spadeadam collection that used to be displayed on site.
An RZ2
RZ2
thumb|right|RZ2 at [[Armagh Planetarium]]The RZ2 was a British design for a LOX / kerosene liquid fuel rocket engine to power the Blue Streak missile....
engine is on display at Armagh Planetarium
Armagh Planetarium
Armagh Planetarium is a planetarium located in Armagh, Northern Ireland close to the city centre and neighbouring Armagh Observatory in approximately fourteen acres of landscaped grounds known as the Armagh Astropark.- History :...
, Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
and The Euro Space Center
Euro Space Center
Euro Space Center is an educational tourist attraction located in Transinne, Belgium, near Redu, devoted to space and astronautics. The centre includes simulators of space flight and micro-gravity...
in Redu
Redu
Redu is a village in the municipality of Libin, in Luxembourg province, Belgium. The village is twinned with Hay-on-Wye in the United Kingdom and it is one of the very first book towns....
, Belgium.
Footage from the Blue Streak launch was briefly incorporated into The Prisoner
The Prisoner
The Prisoner is a 17-episode British television series first broadcast in the UK from 29 September 1967 to 1 February 1968. Starring and co-created by Patrick McGoohan, it combined spy fiction with elements of science fiction, allegory and psychological drama.The series follows a British former...
s final episode, "Fall Out
Fall Out (The Prisoner)
"Fall Out" is the seventeenth and final episode of the allegorical British science fiction series The Prisoner, which starred Patrick McGoohan as the incarcerated Number Six...
". A part of the Blue Streak rocket launched on 5 June 1964 from Woomera
Woomera, South Australia
The town, or village, of Woomera is located in the south east corner of the Woomera Prohibited Area ; colloquially known as the Woomera Rocket Range...
, Australia, found 50 km SE of Giles in 1980 is on display at Giles Weather Station
Giles Weather Station
Giles Weather Station is located in Western Australia near the South Australian border, about West-South-West of Alice Springs and West of Uluru. It is the only staffed weather station within an area of about and is situated mid-continent and near the core of the subtropical jetstream...
. Another piece was located in 2006 but its exact location has been kept secret by the finders. The titanium structure of a German third stage was, for some time, sited on the edge of a gravel pit in Gloucestershire.
See also
- List of missiles
- Rainbow CodesRainbow CodesThe Rainbow Codes were a series of code names used to disguise the nature of various British military research projects. They were mainly used from after the Second World War until 1958, when they were replaced by an alphanumeric code system.-History:...
- Black ArrowBlack ArrowBlack Arrow, officially capitalised BLACK ARROW, was a British satellite carrier rocket. Developed during the 1960s, it was used for four launches between 1969 and 1971...
- Black KnightBlack Knight (rocket)Black Knight was a British launch vehicle to test and verify the design of a re-entry vehicle for the Blue Streak missile.The United Kingdom's first indigenous rocketry project, Black Knight was manufactured by Saunders-Roe on the Isle of Wight, had its engines tested at The Needles and was...
- SkylarkSkylark (rocket)Skylark was a British sounding rocket design. The Skylark was first launched in 1957 from Woomera, Australia and its 441st and final launch took place from Esrange, Sweden on 2 May 2005...
- Nuclear weapons and the United KingdomNuclear weapons and the United KingdomThe United Kingdom was the third country to test an independently developed nuclear weapon, in October 1952. It is one of the five "Nuclear Weapons States" under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which the UK ratified in 1968...
- MartuMartu (Indigenous Australian)Mardu are an Australian Aboriginal people of the Western Desert. Their lands include the Percival Lakes and Pilbara regions in Western Australia...
External links
- http://www.spaceuk.org/bstreak/bstreak.htm
- http://www.skomer.u-net.com/projects/bluestreak.htm
- http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Launchpad/6133/bluestreak.html&date=2009-10-25+06:41:18
- Blue Streak including newsreel footage
- RAF Spadeadam
- National Museum of Scotland description of the Museum of Flight exhibit
- Free papermodel of a Blue Streak missile
- British Public information film on the Blue Streak at the National Archives (15 minutes Quicktime and Windows Media formats)
- BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
– "The Archive Hour – Britain's Space Race". 11 August 2007. - http://www.flightglobal.com/airspace/photos/missilespacesystemscutaways/de-havilland-dh-blue-streak-cutaway-9672.aspx A cutaway drawing of the Blue Streak