On the territory of Australia, in addition to the British nuclear test sites, where atomic bomb tests and experiments with radioactive substances were carried out, there was a large missile test center in the central part of South Australia, which was later transformed into a cosmodrome. Its construction began in April 1947. The area of land designated for the test site made it possible to test all types of rocketry. They decided to build a missile center in an area located 470 km east of the Maralinga nuclear test site. The site was chosen for the test site in a desert area 500 km north of Adelaide, between Lakes Hart and Torrens. Here, due to the large number of sunny days per year and the very low population density, it was possible to test all types of rocketry, including long-range ballistic missiles. The remoteness of the launch sites from large settlements made it possible to safely separate the booster stages of the missiles. And the proximity to the equator increased the payload of the launch vehicles. Under the target field, where the inert missile warheads fell, land in the northwest of Australia was allocated.
In the middle of 1947, to accommodate the maintenance personnel of the construction site 6 km south of the airbase under construction, the construction of the residential village of Woomera (English Woomera - as the spear thrower was called in the language of the Australian aborigines) began. In total, an area of more than 270,000 km² was allocated for testing missile technology. As a result, Woomera became the largest missile test site in the West. The construction of the landfill in the desert cost the UK more than £ 200 million in late 1960s prices.
Significant areas have been allocated for the target field in northwestern Australia. Here, by 1961, a network of radar and communications stations was built, which tracked the launches of long-range missiles and the fall of inert warheads on the experimental field. On the closed territory of the missile range in the southwestern part of Australia, from which the local population was removed, the construction of two capital runways, concreted sites for launching missiles of various classes, large-sized missile hangars, communication and telemetry centers, control and measuring stations began, warehouses for rocket fuel and various materials. Construction was carried out at a very high pace, and the first C-47 transport and passenger aircraft landed on the airbase runway on June 19, 1947.
At a distance of about 35 km north of the airbase, located in the immediate vicinity of the residential village, a second concrete runway was erected, directly adjacent to the main test sites of the missile range. The first tests of rocketry in South Australia began in 1949.
Initially, experimental samples were tested at the test site and meteorological rockets were launched. However, already in 1951, the first tests of the Malkara ATGM ("Shield" in the language of the Australian aborigines) began.
The Malkara ATGM, developed at the Australian Government Aeronautics Research Laboratory, was the first guided anti-tank system to enter service in the UK. The ATGM was guided by the operator in manual mode using a joystick, the visual tracking of the rocket flying at a speed of 145 m / s was carried out by two tracers installed on the wingtips, and the guidance commands were transmitted via a wired line. The first modification had a launch range of only 1800 m, but later this figure was brought to 4000 m. An armor-piercing high-explosive warhead weighing 26 kg was equipped with plastic explosives and could hit an armored object covered with 650 mm of homogeneous armor. With a caliber of 203 mm, the mass and dimensions of the rocket turned out to be very significant: weight 93, 5 kg, length - 1, 9 m, wingspan - 800 mm. The mass and size characteristics of the ATGM made it difficult to transport it, and all its elements could be delivered to the starting position only by vehicles. After the release of a small number of anti-tank systems with launchers installed on the ground, a self-propelled version was developed on the chassis of the Hornet FV1620 armored car.
The first British-Australian guided anti-tank complex turned out to be very cumbersome and heavy, it was planned to use it not only against armored vehicles, but also for the destruction of enemy fortifications and use in the coastal defense system. ATGM "Malkara" was in service with the British army until the mid-70s. Although this complex of guided anti-tank weapons turned out to be not very successful, some of the design solutions implemented in it were used in the creation of the Seacat shipborne short-range air defense system and its land variant Tigercat. These anti-aircraft systems with radio command missile guidance did not shine with high performance, but were cheap and easy to operate.
Control, training and test firing of the first British land-based anti-aircraft missile system in the near zone until the second half of the 1970s was regularly carried out at the Woomera range. In the British Armed Forces, Taygerkat systems were mainly used by anti-aircraft units that had previously been armed with 40-mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns. After comprehending the experience of range shooting, the Air Force command became rather skeptical about the capabilities of this air defense system. The defeat of high-speed and intensively maneuvering targets was impossible. Unlike anti-aircraft guns, the air defense missile system with manual missile guidance could not be used at night and in poor visibility conditions. Therefore, the age of "Taygerkat" in the ground forces, in contrast to its naval counterpart, was short-lived. In the mid-70s, all air defense systems of this type were replaced by more advanced complexes. Even the conservatism characteristic of the British, high mobility, air transportability and the relatively low cost of equipment and anti-aircraft missiles did not help.
Already in the late 1940s, it became clear that in the near future, jet warplanes would dominate the air. In this regard, in 1948 the Australian aircraft company Government Aircraft Factories (GAF) received a contract from the UK to design and build the Jindivik unmanned jet target aircraft. It was supposed to imitate jet combat aircraft and be used during test and control training firing of air defense systems and fighter-interceptors. A manned prototype known as the GAF Pica was the first to be tested in 1950. The first flight of the radio-controlled Jindivik Mk.1 at the Woomera training ground took place in August 1952. Acceleration of the aircraft on takeoff took place on a trolley that remained on the ground, and landing with a parachute.
The unmanned aircraft was equipped with a low-resource engine (10 hours) Armstrong Siddeley Adder (ASA.1) and had an extremely simple and cheap design. The improved Jindivik 3B with the Armstrong Siddeley Viper Mk 201 engine, which developed a thrust of 11.1 kN with a maximum take-off weight of 1655 kg, could accelerate in level flight to 908 km / h. The maximum flight range was 1240 km, the ceiling was 17000 m.
Speed and altitude characteristics close to serial jet combat aircraft, and the ability to install a Luneberg lens made it possible to simulate the widest range of air targets. Despite the unsightly appearance, the Jindivik target aircraft turned out to be a long-liver. It was actively used to train air defense crews in the UK, Australia and the USA. In total, GAF has built more than 500 radio-controlled targets. Serial production lasted from 1952 to 1986. In 1997, by order of the UK, 15 more targets were built.
In addition to anti-tank and anti-aircraft guided missiles, as well as unmanned targets at the Woomera test site, research was introduced to create long-range missiles. One of the first, tested in Australia, was the Skylark rocket ("Skylark") - designed to probe the upper atmosphere and obtain high-altitude photographs. The solid-propellant rocket, created by the Royal Aircraft Establishment and the Rocket Propulsion Establishment, first took off from a test site in South Australia in February 1957 and reached an altitude of 11 km. A steel tower 25 m high was used for launch.
Depending on the modification, the rocket length ranged from 7, 6 to 12, 8 m, diameter - 450 mm, wingspan - 0, 96 m. The first modification contained about 840 kg of mixed fuel, which consisted of ammonium perchlorate, polyisobutylene and aluminum powder. Payload weight - 45 kg. The most powerful two-stage modification, known as the Skylark-12, weighed 1935 kg. Due to the introduction of an additional launch stage and an increase in the energy characteristics of the fuel, the rocket could rise to an altitude of more than 80 km. A total of 441 Skylark high-altitude sounding missiles were launched, 198 of them at the Woomera test site. The last flight of the Skylark in Australia took place in 1978.
In April 1954, the Americans proposed a joint ballistic missile development program to Great Britain. It was assumed that the United States would develop SM-65 Atlas ICBMs with a range of 5,000 nautical miles (9,300 km), and the United Kingdom would undertake the costs of R&D and production of MRBMs with a range of up to 2,000 nautical miles (3,700 km). The British medium-range ballistic missile program is to be implemented under the August 1954 Wilson-Sandis Agreement. In turn, the United States undertook to provide technical support and provide information and technology necessary to create an MRBM in the UK.
The Black Knight missile, which became the first large British liquid-fueled ballistic missile, was considered as an intermediate stage on the way to the creation of the British MRBM. The "Black Knight" was designed by the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) specifically to investigate the movement of ballistic missile warheads in the atmosphere. This rocket was equipped with a Bristol Siddley Gamma Mk.201 engine with a thrust of about 7240 kgf at sea level, later replaced by a more powerful Mk.301 rocket engine with a thrust of about 10,900 kgf. The fuel in the liquid-propellant rocket engine was kerosene, and the oxidizing agent was 85% hydrogen peroxide. The engine running time until the fuel is completely consumed is 145 s. Depending on the modification, the length of the rocket was 10, 2-11, 6 m. The launch weight was 5, 7-6, 5 tons. The diameter was 0, 91 m. The payload was 115 kg. The firing range is over 800 km.
For the first time, the "Black Knight" launched on September 7, 1958 from the British Isle of Wight. In the future, another 21 launches were carried out from the launchers of the Woomera test site. The rocket was tested in both single-stage and two-stage versions. The second stage was the Cuckoo solid-propellant booster from the Skylark high-altitude probe. The separation of the second stage (after the termination of the operation of the first rocket engine) took place on the ascending branch of the trajectory, at an altitude of about 110 km.
Also, as part of the test launches, various options for the heat-shielding coating of warheads were tested. The Black Knight program turned out to be quite successful: 15 of 22 flights were completely successful, the rest were partially successful or emergency. The last launch of the Black Knight took place on November 25, 1965. At a certain stage, on the basis of the Black Knight experimental rocket, it was planned to create a combat MRBM. But calculations have shown that it is impossible to obtain a range of more than 1200 km within the framework of proven technical solutions. Variants of "peaceful use" were also considered, for which it was proposed to equip the "Black Knight" with additional starting stages and use a more powerful upper stage of the second stage. In this case, it became possible to launch a payload into low-earth orbit. But in the end, this option was also rejected.
During the tests of the "Black Knight", conducted jointly with the United States, much attention was paid to the development of radar tracking of missile warheads. Based on the results of the experiments, British experts came to the conclusion that the timely detection and tracking of warheads of the MRBM and ICBMs, and the precise guidance of interceptor missiles at them is a very difficult task. As a result, the UK abandoned the creation of its own missile defense system, but it was decided to take measures to make the British warheads difficult targets to intercept.
On the basis of the developments obtained during the launches of the experimental missiles of the Black Knight family and the American technologies used in the creation of the Atlas ICBMs, in the UK, specialists from DeHavilland, Rolls-Royce and Sperry began to design the Blue Streak IRBM.).
The rocket had an "Atlas" diameter of 3.05 m, a length (without a warhead) of 18.75 m and a mass of more than 84 tons. The oxidizer tank contained 60.8 tons of liquid oxygen, the fuel tank - 26.3 tons of kerosene. As a payload, it was supposed to use a 1 Mt monoblock thermonuclear warhead. The maximum launch range is up to 4800 km. The launch on alert was to be carried out from a silo launcher. Refueling with oxygen - immediately before launch, after entering the flight task.
Taking into account that the existing and prospective British bombers carrying free-falling nuclear bombs could not guaranteed to break through the constantly strengthening Soviet air defense system, medium-range missiles were considered as an alternative to aircraft delivery vehicles for nuclear weapons. However, the weaknesses of the Blue Streak as a combat system were its bulkiness and the use of liquid oxygen. Critics of the British MRBM program rightly pointed out that even with a silo-based MRBM, due to a sufficiently long prelaunch preparation, a potential adversary will be able to neutralize all British silo launchers with a sudden nuclear missile strike. In addition, the construction of highly protected silos and launch complexes, the sites for which were chosen in southern and northeastern England and eastern Scotland, were associated with colossal costs. In this regard, the British military department abandoned the use of Blue Streak and reoriented to the American sea-based missile Polaris. Nuclear submarines equipped with UGM-27C Polaris A-3 ballistic missiles with a launch range of up to 4600 km, while on combat patrol, were immune to a disarming strike.
In total, 16 Blue Streak missiles were assembled in the DeHavilland workshops, of which 11 units were launched at the Woomera test site. At the same time, 4 starts were recognized as completely successful. By the beginning of 1960, more than £ 60 million had been spent on the creation and testing of Blue Streak from the British budget. After the curtailment of the British MRBM program, Defense Secretary Harold Watkinson announced that "the project will continue as a satellite launch vehicle." However, the need to develop a British launch vehicle in 1960 was not obvious. At that time, there were no ready-made reconnaissance or communications spacecraft in the UK. On their creation, it was necessary to spend approximately another £ 20 million. Also, in this case, there was a need to build new tracking and telemetry receiving stations in Australia and other countries. At the same time, the carrier rocket, created on the basis of the Blue Streak MRBM, had a small weight to be thrown into orbit - recognized as insufficient for a full-fledged satellite for long-distance communications, meteorology, navigation and remote sensing of the Earth.
It was decided to use the developments obtained during the implementation of the Blue Streak and Black Knight programs when creating the Black Prince launch vehicle. In fact, the new launch vehicle was a design in which the Blue Streak MRBM was used as the first stage, the Black Knight rocket served as the second stage, and the third stage propulsion system operated on solid fuel. According to calculations, the "Black Prince" launch vehicle was supposed to provide a payload with a mass of 960 kg to an altitude of 740 km.
The main obstacle in the creation of the British RN Black Prince was the banal lack of money. The British government hoped that Australia and Canada would join the program. However, the Canadian government agreed only to the construction of a tracking station on its territory, while Australia limited itself to the allocation of a new air corridor in the northwest direction. As a result, not a single Black Prince launch vehicle was built.
Since the second half of the 1950s, a "space race" was conducted between the USA and the USSR, which was largely stimulated by the improvement of ballistic missiles and the interest of the military in space communications and reconnaissance. But at that time, the highest ranks of the British military department did not express interest in creating their own defense spacecraft and carriers capable of delivering them to low-earth orbit. In addition, the British, in the event of the need for the development of military space, counted on the help of the United States. However, under pressure from the scientific community, the British government was forced to take practical steps to develop its own space program. The British once again tried to create an international space consortium. In January 1961, British representatives traveled to Germany, Norway, Denmark, Italy, Switzerland and Sweden, and technical experts from 14 European countries were invited to England. The fears of the British to noticeably lag behind not only the USSR and the USA, but also France, became the reason that London attempted an independent breakthrough into space within the framework of the Black Arrow project. In terms of its characteristics, the British launch vehicle approached the American light-class Scout launch vehicle. But in the end, the American "Scout" turned out to be much cheaper and many times surpassed the English "Black Arrow" in the number of starts.
The three-stage Black Arrow launch vehicle was developed by Bristol Siddley Engines in conjunction with Westland Aircraft. According to the design data, the rocket had a length of 13.2 m, a maximum diameter of 2 m and a launch mass of 18.1 tons. It could launch a satellite with a mass of 100 kg into a polar near-earth orbit with an altitude of 556 km.
The engines of the first and second stages, as well as on the experimental rocket "Black Knight", ran on kerosene and hydrogen peroxide. The British launch vehicle "Black Arrow" was unique in terms of the use of a fuel pair: "kerosene-hydrogen peroxide". In world rocketry, hydrogen peroxide was used in most cases as an auxiliary component to drive a turbopump unit. The third stage used a Waxwing solid-propellant engine. He worked on a mixed fuel and for that time had very high specific characteristics.
Simultaneously with the design and construction of launch vehicles at the Woomera test site, they began to build launch facilities, hangars for the final assembly of stages, laboratories for checking onboard equipment, fuel and oxidizer storage. This, in turn, required an increase in the number of service personnel.
As of the mid-1960s, more than 7,000 people permanently lived in the village at the Woomera test site. The control and measuring complex designed to control and monitor the launch vehicle in flight has also undergone improvement.
In total, 7 monitoring and tracking stations for ballistic missiles and spacecraft were built on the territory of Australia. Island Lagoon and Nurrungar stations were located in the immediate vicinity of the landfill. Also, to support especially important missile launches, a mobile center with equipment located in towed vans was deployed at the test site.
Subsequently, the Australian communication and tracking centers for space objects were used in the implementation of the American space programs Mercury, Gemini and Apollo, and also communicated with American and European interplanetary spacecraft.
The Black Arrow launch vehicles were built in the UK and final assembled in Australia. A total of five missiles were built. Since the British could not find foreign partners willing to share the financial burden of the Black Arrow program, due to budgetary constraints, it was decided to reduce the flight test cycle to three launches.
The first test launch of the "black arrow" took place on June 28, 1969. The launch vehicle was launched along the "short" northwestern route, along which Black Knight high-altitude rockets had previously been launched. However, due to malfunctions in the engine control system, which led to strong vibrations, the launch vehicle began to collapse in the air, and for safety reasons it was blown up on command from the control point at an altitude of 8 km. During the second launch, which took place on March 4, 1970, the test program was fully completed, which made it possible to proceed to the launch phase with a payload. The Black Arrow, which launched from the Woomera test site on September 2, 1970, was supposed to launch the Orba satellite into low-earth orbit, designed to study the upper atmosphere. The launch was carried out along the "long" northeastern route. At first everything went well, but after separating the first stage and starting the second stage engine, after a while it reduced power and shut down 30 seconds earlier. Although the solid-propellant third stage worked normally, it was not possible to put the satellite into orbit, and it fell into the ocean.
On October 28, 1971, the Black Arrow launch vehicle successfully launched from the launch pad of the Woomera test site, which launched the Prospero satellite into near-earth orbit. The mass of the spacecraft was 66 kg, the height at perigee was 537 km, and at apogee - 1539 km. In fact, it was an experimental demonstration spacecraft. Prospero was developed for testing solar batteries, communication systems and telemetry. It also carried a detector for measuring the concentration of cosmic dust.
The launch of the Black Arrow booster with the Prospero satellite took place after the British government decided to curtail the Black Arrow booster program. The last built fifth copy of the Black Arrow launch vehicle was never launched, and is now in the London Science Museum. Refusal to further develop its own space industry led to the fact that Great Britain left the club of countries capable of independently launching satellites into near-earth orbit and independently of other states to conduct space exploration. However, after the termination of the launches of British ballistic missiles and carrier rockets, the Australian Woomera test site did not stop functioning. In the 1970s, it was very actively used to test British military missiles for various purposes. But this will be discussed in the final part of the review.
