Very interesting. The new solid propellant is a particularly important development--it says that it only burns in the presence of a liquid oxidizer, which implies that the engine could be stopped by shutting down the oxidizer. Solid motors are great for lifting heavy loads, but traditionally they can't be shut down once they start--that's a hazard when human payloads are involved.
I'm glad to see private industry getting directly involved in space flight, because that has been the private playground of a few large corporations. Competition is always a good thing, if the goal is reliable and affordable access to services.
But I have to take exception with this statement from the link:
"The ability to launch in the Southern Hemisphere will redress a major imbalance in climate data as most launches to date have been in the Northern Hemisphere. There’s currently a big gap in high-altitude or near space data recorded in the Southern Hemisphere."
That's a misleading statement. NASA studies the world's climate by launching orbital spacecraft, not sounding rockets like the Atea-1. All orbiting spacecraft cross the equator twice in each orbit, no matter where they are launched. They all spend equal time over the north and south hemispheres. In fact, many climate-studying spacecraft are in sun-synchronous polar orbits, so they pass over the North and South Poles once in each orbit.
So yeah, most sub-orbital sounding rockets have been launched in the Northern Hemisphere, but those have not been the most important tools for climate study for, oh, about 40 years.
I've worked on several Earth Observing Satellites at a NASA facility since 1975, so I'm very interested in this kind of development.
Ed
