UK MRBM and Nuclear Tests in Australia: Kids Wave

Australia has a rich heritage of missile delivery and nuclear weapon tests. Much knowledge, plans and designs have been quietly retained in Canberra.

The video here and above and description below is courtesy of Youtube user Steve. 

The Blue Streak rocket [aka Medium Range Ballistic Missile (MRBM)] was originally a British ballistic missile designed in 1955. 

The missiles used liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants. Whilst the vehicle could be left fully laden with 20+ tonnes of kerosene, the 60 tonnes of liquid oxygen had to be loaded immediately before launch or icing became a problem. Due to this, fuelling the rocket took 15 minutes, which would have made it useless as a rapid response to an attack. The missile was vulnerable to a pre-emptive attack, launched without warning or in the absence of any heightening of tension sufficient to warrant readying the missile, if such a circumstance were ever likely. 

The ballistic missile programme was cancelled in 1960 but the rocket was used as the first-stage of the European satellite launcher Europa. As no site in Britain provided enough space for test flights, a test site was established at the Woomera rocket range in the South Australian desert. 

This footage comes from an ABC documentary about government efforts to find and relocate aborigines living in the dump zone area in Western Australia. The Blue Streak project was finally cancelled in 1972.

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Here and below is a longer video that provides a broader perspective of Blue Streak in the context of the much larger UK nuclear development and test in Australia program. This is courtesy of Australia's government owned ABC Four Corners. After 52 seconds into the video viewers can get past the Monty Python-esque presentation style. 

6 minutes in - notice that Australian nuclear cooperation with Britain started with Labor Prime Minister Ben Chifley, not later with Menzies (as is generally presumed).