A rocket powered by candle wax and oxygen has launched from a facility on South Australia's West Coast. It's the first time the test range at Koonibba has been used with the locals hopeful it'll lead to ongoing jobs in the space industry in the region.
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00:00 It went off with a bang.
00:05 From an Aboriginal community on South Australia's west coast into sub-orbit.
00:09 Overseas customers coming to little old Canibba, who would have thought that?
00:14 Our kiddies are over the moon, our community over the moon.
00:18 German company High Impulse launched its rocket from the commercial space range.
00:23 It's the first test of the facility that's jointly owned by the Canibba community
00:28 and Adelaide based company Southern Launch.
00:31 And it's here to stay until whenever for our next generation to take over when we're gone.
00:36 Having a rocket in their backyard has brought educational benefits for the west coast region,
00:41 particularly the 28 students at Canibba School.
00:44 When you build upon Aboriginal knowledge of aerodynamics
00:48 through boomerang and spear making and the woomera,
00:53 Aboriginal people have been tinkering in aerodynamics for a long, long time.
00:57 So we thought, right, let's build upon that.
01:00 Maybe next we'll have a genius out there that'll get into rockets.
01:05 The rocket launch is testing a hybrid propulsion technology
01:09 using solid paraffin fuel and liquid oxygen.
01:13 The rocket will reach an altitude of 60 kilometres before parachuting back to Earth,
01:18 where a helicopter will retrieve it.
01:21 But not everybody supports the space project,
01:23 with some concerned with where the rockets will land.
01:26 It's our pharmacy, our school, our church, our spiritualities out here.
01:31 It's all those things to us.
01:33 It's not just vacant, unoccupied land.
01:38 It's all special.
01:39 Southern Launch says it gained all the appropriate approvals for the range
01:44 and the wider Canibba community says it's united in its support.
01:48 Well, I reckon it's great and everyone's excited for this to happen.
01:53 More missions are scheduled for later this year.
01:57 [Silence]