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ROCKETS

"This is Mission Control Auckland." Who would have thought you'd
ever hear that? This was a Tweet from a Kiwi in awe of the
achievements of Peter Beck and his company, Rocketlab. I could
not let the achievement of NZ putting four satellites into space go
without doing an article on Rocket miniatures. I was 6 years old
when the world’s first satellite, Sputnik I was launched and was
immediately hooked. I never expected to get into space myself (and
still don’t) but you can always dream.

Peter Beck had a dream and had the technical knowhow and drive
to make that dream come true. His dream was not to compete with
the likes of Space-X but to make satellite launches affordable. The
rocket bodies are made of carbon fibre, a technique that NZ
companies developed for the Americas Cup yachts. The engines are 3D printed and the
fuel delivery is unique, both developed by Peter Beck. The company plans to do one launch
a month this year and two a month next year from their NZ launch site and also have
launch facilities at Cape Canaveral and on the US west coast.

The three satellites that Rocketlab put into
orbit cost US$5M each to launch, a small
fraction of the cost to launch on any other
rocket. Yes I just said three and above I said
four. That is because the fourth one was built
by Peter Beck himself and launched for free.
A photograph of the satellite and Peter Beck
are on the left. Called “Humanity Star” it is a
polygonal carbon-fibre sphere consisting of 65
panels that reflect sunlight as it spins. It is
visible from Earth with the naked eye and will
be the brightest thing in the night sky for about 9 months before burning up in the
atmosphere. “The goal is to make people look up and realize they are on a rock in a giant
universe,” Beck said in a statement.

About time we had some miniatures, although there are surprisingly
few on a rocket or space theme. On the right is a very poor photo of
a rocket on the launch pad. This is a Russian ceramic but was
bottled by Global Whisky & Spirits of Germany.
Starting the next page are 4 rockets by Austrian company, Casali
and a Slovignac brandy made by a Czech company. Rounding up
the top of the next page is a rocket from Portugal but I do not know
the maker. Do you?

I had to include Carol’s Stardust from Dug’s Brothel Series, one of
my favourite bottles. It’s not long since the next bottle featured in
miNiZ, so suffice to say it is Arbeg Galileo, complete with capsule.

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