Courtesy / bluShift
Stardust 1.0 lifts off.
February 1, 2021
Brunswick’s bluShift launches rocket successfully, despite frigid weather
Courtesy / bluShift
Stardust 1.0 floats back to earth after flying nearly 5,000 feet.
Brunswick-based rocket-maker bluShift Aerospace on Sunday launched what’s thought to be Maine’s first commercial rocket and the world's first commercial rocket powered by biofuel.
The prototype rocket, called Stardust 1.0, blasted off from the former Loring Air Force Base, now the Loring Commerce Centre, in Limestone.
To view the launch, click here.
Originally scheduled for 10 a.m., the launch was delayed twice due to ignition issues thought to be caused by the day’s frigid temperature.
“We have made history here in Limestone, Maine,” bluShift founder and CEO Sascha Deri said after the launch. “This is the very first commercial rocket launch in Maine. This is the very first commercial launch of a rocket powered by biofuel in the world.”
As a third countdown neared, just before 3 p.m., there was an only-in-Maine moment when the sequence was paused to let some snowmobilers pass.
At liftoff, the makeshift control room erupted in cheers and a slight sense of surprise.
“Oh, my gosh! Yay!” was heard over the livestream.
The stream drew about 2,000 viewers from around the world, including NASA.
The rocket flew upward nearly 5,000 feet, a matter of perhaps 20 seconds. Parachutes automatically deployed to bring it back down gently, within just a few hundred feet of the launch trailer. A special “crumple system” under the engine prevented it from being damaged upon landing.
The bluShift team started the day before dawn with the temperature down to minus 14 degrees, which posed problems for rocket operations and networking and communication equipment, Deri said during a post-launch debriefing.
The team figured out solutions to warm up the equipment.
Although the ignition engine fired during the first countdown, a main valve that wouldn’t open prevented liftoff. Ignition problems stymied the second liftoff as well.
Deri said he and his engineers took the problems as a useful learning experience.
The actual launch?
Courtesy / bluShift
Stardust 1.0 was launched from a portable trailer on the runway at the Loring Commerce Centre.
“It went perfectly,” he said.
The team snowmobiled to the landing site to recover the payload section within minutes after landing.
The original plan was to launch the prototype last October, which would have been far less challenging from the temperature standpoint, Deri noted.
The successful launch positions the team to build a full-size engine for launch into suborbital space in the rocket’s next iteration, called Stardust 2.0, which is already in design. That launch will take place off the coast of Maine, likely between Jonesport and Cutler, he said.
Subsequent plans include building Starless Rogue for suborbital space, reaching 150 miles; then Red Dwarf, a low-Earth orbit launch vehicle.
Screenshot / bluShift
A view of the parachute, shot by a camera inside the payload bay as the rocket returned to earth.
Deri said he’s seeking $650,000 in angel investment for the Stardust 2.0 build, with a goal to launch it by the end of 2021. He said he’s also in the midst of hiring more engineers, most of whom have been identified and a few still to find and likely to be consultants. The company also plans to license some NASA technology that’s expected to accelerate bluShift’s timeline.
In early January, bluShift conducted a land-based test of its hybrid rocket engine, dubbed Modular Adaptable Rocket Engine for Vehicle Launch, or MAREVL for short.
A subsequent rocket launch was scheduled for Jan. 15, but it was aborted because of cloud cover.
Powered by a nontoxic, carbon-neutral, bio-derived fuel made entirely from materials that can be grown on farms across America. Stardust 1.0 was designed to demonstrate a low-cost and reliable alternative to traditional fuel without sacrificing efficiency.
“We’re interested in developing this company in Maine, manufacturing the rockets in Maine and developing an important part of the Maine Space Port,” Deri said in separate video.
The Maine Space Grant Consortium is developing a plan for the Maine Spaceport Complex, with Brunswick Landing campus as mission control for a program that would launch cubesats — small satellites — from the Commerce Centre in Limestone.
bluShift’s low-altitude demo launch was the culmination of six years of research and development, over 200 engine tests, the realization of grants from NASA and the Maine Technology Institute, and the development of the novel modular hybrid rocket engine. The mission carried one academic and two commercial customer payloads.
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