Tag: space center

This Off-The-Beaten-Path Japanese Island Is A Coastal Gem Offering Beaches, Yoga, And Rocket Launches

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Just off the southern coast of Kyushu lies Tanegashima, an island where tropical beaches, wellness retreats, and rocket launches coexist. Part of Kagoshima Prefecture, it’s the second largest of the Ōsumi Islands. Unlike its neighboring secluded Japanese island, Yakushima, Tanegashima is relatively flat with gentle slopes that lead to wide stretches of beach and fields of sugarcane. Its subtropical climate supports lush vegetation, including banyan and palm trees. With clear waters lapping at the shore and a scenic landscape, Tanegashima offers a place to swim, practice yoga, and even watch rockets launch into orbit from the island’s space center.

Long before it became known for rocket launches, Tanegashima played a key role in Japan’s first encounter with Europeans. In 1543, a Portuguese ship accidentally landed on the island after veering off course. With them came advanced firearms, a technology previously unknown in Japan. Tanegashima’s local lord recognized their value and purchased several weapons. He later commissioned local swordsmiths to reproduce both the guns and their gunpowder. This encounter sparked a major shift in Japanese warfare. Centuries later, in 1969, Tanegashima underwent another transformation when the Tanegashima Space Center, Japan’s largest rocket launch facility, was developed.

Read more: 25 Gorgeous Islands For Vacationing That Won’t Break The Bank

View rocket launches from the Tanegashima Space Center

Satellite towers between hills and by the beach in Tanegashima – Norimoto/Getty Images

There were several practical reasons why Tanegashima was chosen as the site for Japan’s space center. Its location closer to the equator lets rockets take advantage of Earth’s rotation and makes launches more efficient. The island’s remoteness also minimizes disruption to Japan’s fishing zones. Additionally, Tanegashima had the necessary infrastructure to support space operations. This included available land, along with access to communication systems, water, electricity, and public transportation.

Today, the Tanegashima Space Center covers nearly 104 million square feet and serves as Japan’s primary launch site for orbital missions. The facility includes areas for assembling satellites, inspecting parts, and launching rockets. Visitors can watch live launches from the Takesaki Observation Stand, which offers wide views of the coastline. The complex also features a free Space Museum with hands-on exhibits and real rocket components that visitors can touch. Within the museum, the Liftoff Theatre lets guests experience a simulated rocket launch that consists of sound and smoke effects.

Explore Tanegashima’s coastal beauty and yoga destinations

Rocks over blue waters and along a sandy beach in Tanegashima – norinori303/Shutterstock

Along with exploring the space center, Tanegashima’s coastline is one of the main attractions of the island. Its beaches are known for white sand and calm water, which makes them ideal for a range of activities. On the island’s northern tip, Urada Beach offers swimming and snorkeling in clear waters where colorful tropical fish are usually visible. Toward the southern coast, near the space center, Takezaki Beach is a popular surfing spot among sandstone cliffs. About 18 minutes away by car, Hamada Beach is home to the Chikura no Iwaya cave. Visitors can enter the sea cave during low tide and take in views of the ocean.

Beyond outdoor recreation, Tanegashima is a destination for wellness travelers. In 2020, Nishinoomote City was certified as a “Sacred Place of Yoga.” The designation was given because of its natural landscapes, which are believed to support physical and mental well-being. Yoga sessions are usually held on beaches or coastal overlooks, where participants can meditate by the sea.

Travelers can reach Tanegashima by flying into Tanegashima Airport from either Osaka, nicknamed “Japan’s Kitchen,” or Kagoshima, often called the “Naples Of Japan.” Alternatively, ferries leave regularly from Kagoshima Port. Travel times vary from 45 minutes to three and a half hours, depending on the type of vessel. Once on the island, rental cars are the most convenient way to get around. To see some of Tanegashima’s scenic highlights, the Tanegashima Route offers a recommended driving course that passes beaches, coastal roads, and the island’s space center.

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Read the original article on Islands.

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October 21, 2025
A successful liftoff: Space shuttle Endeavour’s rockets are installed

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In a delicate maneuver, crews this week successfully lifted into place giant rockets at the California Science Center, the first large components installed at the future home of the space shuttle Endeavour.

Donated by Northrup Grumman, the solid rocket motors are each the size of a Boeing 757 fuselage and weigh 104,000 pounds. They had to be carefully moved from a horizontal to vertical position by crane before being lowered into place in the new exhibit at the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center.

One was installed Tuesday, the other Wednesday.

Crews were then able to place the 177 pins attaching each solid rocket motor to the base of the solid rocket booster, known as the aft skirt. Each pin is 1 inch in diameter and about 2 inches long.

“It felt great,” California Science Center President Jeffrey Rudolph said of the successful installation. “We’ve got two solid rocket motors standing tall in the new building now.”

Visitors to the museum can now see the top of the rockets from outside the construction site. At one point during the crane lift, the solid rocket motors could even be seen from the 110 Freeway.

This week’s installations mark the latest milestone in the six-month mission to assemble the permanent exhibit for Endeavour, the last space shuttle orbiter ever built. When completed, it will be arranged in a full stack configuration as if it were ready for launch. It will be the only surviving U.S. orbiter displayed in this position.

The future home of Endeavour is under construction at the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center site.

(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

Typically, during the era of space shuttle flights, this procedure would’ve been done at NASA’s Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. There, the shuttle’s full stack would‘ve been assembled in one of the largest buildings by volume in the world, rising more than 50 stories and equipped with plenty of cranes and platforms from which to work.

At the California Science Center, crews had to develop unique techniques for the installation. This week, workers put together scaffolding along the aft skirts so they could get where they needed to insert the connecting pins.

If the aft skirt and solid rocket motors didn’t align correctly, every pin could’ve taken some banging and pounding to insert, and the installation of each rocket could’ve taken all day and into the night.

Instead, Tuesday’s work began around 9 a.m. and ended before 1 p.m. With one successful installation under their belts, workers were even quicker Wednesday — beginning at 8 a.m. and wrapping up by 10.

“The crew worked really well, did an excellent job and things came together effectively and quite quickly,” Rudolph said.

The next step will be to build another 30 vertical feet of scaffolding to install external tank attach rings, which eventually will serve as a connection between the solid rocket motors and the giant orange external tank.

Later, even more scaffolding will rise to the top of the 116-foot solid rocket motors. That will help workers install the tips of the rockets, known as the forward assembly, which includes the nose cone and forward skirt.

The forward skirt is particularly important as it will be the primary weight-bearing connection between the solid rocket boosters and the external tank. It is likely to be installed in early December.

Each solid rocket motor makes up most of the length of the 149-foot solid rocket boosters. At liftoff, the white boosters were set underneath Endeavour’s wings and produced more than 80% of the lift.

A child walks to the California Science Center in Exposition Park in Los Angeles, where the space shuttle is slowly being pieced together.

(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

The most dramatic installations will take place after the winter holidays. The external tank will be lifted into place no sooner than early January.

The Endeavour orbiter will be installed no earlier than the last week of January. Cranes — the tallest of which will be about the height of Los Angeles City Hall — will raise Endeavour from its horizontal position to point vertically to the stars for its final display. The rest of the museum will then be built around it.

Once complete, the $400-million Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center will rise 20 stories tall. The California Science Center Foundation is still raising funds for the last $50 million needed for the project.

Since Endeavour’s arrival at the center in 2012, the orbiter has been on display in the temporary Samuel Oschin Pavilion, essentially a warehouse, where it will be shown until Dec. 31. After that, it could be years before Endeavour will again be available for up-close viewing.

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November 10, 2023
Kronos Fusion Energy Recognizes Mankind’s Path to Becoming an Interplanetary Species

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Press Release
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Mar 22, 2022

ARLINGTON, Va., March 22, 2022 (Newswire.com)
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The sun, like all known stars, is in essence, a giant mass of hot gas, mainly hydrogen and helium. The temperature and pressure in its core are so high that nuclear fusion occurs, producing plasma that releases huge amounts of energy. The outward pressure of this plasma is balanced by the inward pull of gravity, leaving the star in hydrostatic equilibrium – producing virtually unimaginable amounts of clean, stable energy, for billions of years. This science is part of the core that drives Kronos Fusion Energy.

Recreating these conditions within a fusion generator has been the subject of 60 years of research around the world. This research is now on the cusp of realizing viable, powerful, and clean energy that enables the efficient delivery of personnel, material, and energy systems to future colonies. This technology is reaching maturation just as a new dawn of space exploration is emerging – as stated in the March 17, 2022, Summit by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, “The time for fusion energy is now.”

Thought leaders from Stephen Hawking to Elon Musk agree that the future of mankind lies in our ability to become a multi-planetary species. Their rationale states that, so long as humanity has all its eggs in one basket – or all its people on one planet – there will always be the risk of an extinction-level event. In fact, if history is our guide, this risk becomes a near inevitability.

The only true way to mitigate this risk is through our ability to establish settlements on other planets, and fusion energy holds the key to making this a reality.

In 1620, the privately funded Mayflower and her civilian pilgrims, not a government-led mission, paved the way for the creation of what today is called America. Four hundred years later, the first privately funded and operated space flights carried civilian passengers into space, bringing into global focus the continued relevance of the role that private industry must play in future space programs and planetary colonization efforts. Kronos Fusion Energy Incorporated (KFEI) is at the forefront of these efforts, as demonstrated by its commitment to establishing the National Fusion Energy Space Center.

Priyanca Ford, Founder of KFEI, affirmed this aim: “Kronos Fusion Energy has spent the last seven years developing and refining algorithms and simulations that allow us to bring fusion energy out of the lab and into the space programs of tomorrow. This exciting technology transforms space travel, providing for rapid and agile spacecraft, capable of carrying substantial payloads and delivering vast amounts of electrical power in a compact device – essential to reaching, establishing, and sustaining life on future planetary colonies.”

For more information:

Press Contact – Erin Pendleton – pr@kronosfusionenergy.com

Source: Kronos Fusion Energy

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March 22, 2022