The 100-kg satellite platform, ElaraSat, will carry a hyperspectral imager from CSIRO when it lifts off on 21 June from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
Gilmour is one of a handful of Australian firms creating satellites and satellite buses (effectively the fuselage or main body) such as Fleet, Inovor, Space Machines Company and Skykraft.
Also on the same mission will be a third Varda capsule that will eventually re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere and land at South Australia’s Koonibba Test Range.
Transporter 14 is a dedicated rideshare flight to a sun-synchronous orbit with dozens of small microsatellites and nanosatellites for commercial and government customers.
The previous mission, Transporter-13, carried the second of Defence’s Buccaneer satellite, designed to fine-tune the performance of a RAAF radar, as well as the previous Varda capsule.
The news of Gilmour’s imminent satellite launch on a SpaceX rocket comes after it was forced to delay the launch of its own vehicle, Eris, last month.
Gilmour Space Technologies opened the launch window on 15 May, following multiple delays caused by Tropical Cyclone Alfred, which shut down large parts of Queensland.
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However, the company later blamed the scrub on an “unexpected power surge”, which triggered the deployment mechanism of the rocket’s payload fairing, also known as the carbon-fibre nose cone.
“While shutdowns are a normal part of launch operations, this issue didn’t appear during previous tests – the fairing separation system is single-use and isn’t activated to maintain its reliability and ensure safety,” Gilmour said.
“We’re now installing safeguards to prevent this from happening again. These upgrades will be verified in our system test before the next flight.
“We will share a new ‘No Earlier Than’ (NET) launch window for TestFlight1 once confirmed.”
The delay was the second encountered during the launch window, after issues with the power system and a connection to the launch tower scrubbed the very first attempt.
After the cancellation was confirmed, though, founder Adam Gilmour played down the problem, revealing the rocket wasn’t damaged and a replacement part was already available.
“Our team encountered the issue before fuelling and lift-off, which is exactly what ground testing is meant to do,” he said. “While we’re disappointed by the delay, we’re already working through a resolution and expect to be back on the pad soon.”
Eris is a three-stage orbital vehicle and the first to be almost entirely Australian-designed and manufactured. The launch would mark one of the most significant moments in the local sector’s history and the first attempt at an orbital blast-off in 50 years from Australian soil.
Gilmour has repeatedly stated that the initial blast-off of Eris is likely to end in failure and admitted that a flight time of 20 or 30 seconds would be “fantastic”.
A flight time of 30 seconds would see it crash down within its Bowen launch site, while a flight time of one minute or longer would see it fall into the ocean, which has been designated as part of an exclusion zone.
Gilmour has been developing Eris for over eight years and believes it could address a gap in the global market for small satellite launches.
It had planned for an inaugural blast-off in April 2024 but faced a lengthy delay in obtaining its final permit from the Australian Space Agency.
Adam Thorn
Adam is a journalist who has worked for more than 40 prestigious media brands in the UK and Australia. Since 2005, his varied career has included stints as a reporter, copy editor, feature writer and editor for publications as diverse as Fleet Street newspaper The Sunday Times, fashion bible Jones, media and marketing website Mumbrella as well as lifestyle magazines such as GQ, Woman’s Weekly, Men’s Health and Loaded. He joined Momentum Media in early 2020 and currently writes for Australian Aviation and World of Aviation.
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