Elon Musk may seem to have a stranglehold on launching satellites and other stuff into outer space, but not if a start-up based at Alameda Point has anything to do with it.<\/p>\n
Called Longshot Space Technologies, the company\u2019s team of engineers is diligently toiling away to develop a new, far cheaper method that uses a cannon filled with compressed gases \u2014 nitrogen for testing and ultimately hydrogen for space launches.<\/p>\n
At the heart of this new approach are three 40-foot segments of regular sewer pipe welded together with ports cut into the sides to inject the compressed gas. Right now the cannon is being readied for its first test launch in a building not far from Longshot\u2019s headquarters around the corner from Faction Brewery at the far east end of the former Naval Air Station Alameda. The test building is purpose-built for experimental firings, as it was originally used by the U.S. Navy to fire weapons and features 18-inch, sound-deadening concrete walls.<\/p>\n
Ultimately, Longshot will only test its launcher in Alameda. When it\u2019s time to fire it up for real \u2014 a process that will include a loud series of pops as the projectile makes its way down the pipe past each injection portal \u2014 the company has secured a desert site in Tonopah, Nevada, that\u2019s far from large population centers. They\u2019re also considering other remote spots in New Mexico and elsewhere.<\/p>\n
Lauren Liddell, Longshot\u2019s chief of staff and a former NASA mission scientist, says Longshot\u2019s purpose is not to send humans into space \u2014 Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are already doing that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe purpose of our kinetic gas propulsion is to get everything else \u2014 the infrastructure \u2014 into space,\u201d Liddell says. \u201cTo bring the cost of space launch down and open up the capability and possibility for many more generations. \u2026 I want to live in a world where I could go and conduct experiments on the south pole of the Moon.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to go and see how deep space radiation beyond low earth orbit is going to affect humans when we send our daughters and their daughters out into space to live on the Moon. Let\u2019s say you want to go and stay on the Airbnb on the south pole of the Moon: all the infrastructure to build the hotel, the swimming pools, the restaurants that you would visit? You want to get all that stuff up there. That\u2019s what we\u2019re hoping to build.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mike Grace, Longshot\u2019s chief executive officer and co-founder who is also a former NASA employee, came up with the concept for Longshot while in graduate school at San Jose State in 2019, when he got sidetracked focusing on \u201cbetter ways of getting the price of putting stuff into space down. And I hit this idea.\u201d<\/p>\n
That idea, namely, is using compressed hydrogen gas instead of costly rocket fuel. Grace likes to compare the technology Longshot uses to that of a toy many can relate to: the humble, beloved potato gun.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no combustion taking place. That\u2019s the potato gun. You\u2019re using an air compressor, and then off it goes. So to the degree that it\u2019s the world\u2019s largest, fanciest, most precise potato gun, sure. If I\u2019m trying to describe what this is to somebody at a bus stop, those are the terms that I would use because it\u2019s evocative. \u2018World\u2019s largest potato gun for throwing stuff straight into space. Do not pass go. No rocket,\u2019\u2009\u201d says Grace.<\/p>\n
While the actual firing of Longshot\u2019s rocket won\u2019t take place in Alameda, Grace is bullish about keeping the company\u2019s headquarters on the Island, where it moved from Oakland last fall. Also, though most of Longshot\u2019s 20 to 30 employees now live in Silicon Valley, including Grace, he is offering them and new hires a $10,000 bonus to move to Alameda.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really hard to find a labor pool like this anywhere else in the world,\u201d says Grace. \u201cYou\u2019ve got an enormous number of people with really sophisticated technical backgrounds who think stuff like this is really cool who are also extremely risk-taking. Because of a selection bias, they congregate here because if you want to swing for the fences with an engineering degree, where else in the world are you going to go?<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you\u2019re building something like a cannon for throwing satellites into space, having access to people who have advanced degrees in fluid dynamics and metallurgy and things that you need who are interested in doing something crazy, it\u2019s not something you get anywhere else,\u201d says Grace.<\/p>\n
Another factor in Alameda Point\u2019s long-term status as Longshot\u2019s headquarters is the ferry access.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat ferry is a game-changer in terms of the labor force that this town is able to attract. So as an employer thinking about Alameda Point, if that ferry wasn\u2019t here, this would be a much harder sell.\u201d<\/p>\n
For more information about Longshot visit longshotspace.com<\/a> online.<\/p>\n