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The private space exploration company SpaceX has chosen a site in south Texas as the location where it wants to build a launch pad, the state’s governor’s office said on Monday.
The site is in the Brownsville area, about 445 km south of San Antonio near the Mexican border, Governor Rick Perry’s office said in a statement. It will be the world’s first commercial rocket launch pad, the statement said.
The state is providing $2.3 million to bring the facility to Texas. It will provide an additional $13 million for infrastructure, according to the announcement.
The facility will launch commercial satellites, according to the statement. SpaceX founder Elon Musk said the launch pad would bring high tech jobs to the area, inspire students and attract tourists.
“Texas has been on the forefront of our nation’s space exploration efforts for decades, so it is fitting that SpaceX has chosen our state as they expand the frontiers of commercial space flight,” Perry said in the statement.
NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston served as a hub for US human space exploration from the agency’s earliest projects.
The new facility still needs final approval from local authorities and additional permits, the statement said. SpaceX, founded in 2002 and based in California, was the first private corporation to send a liquid-fuel rocket into space and return it. Its Dragon spacecraft is contracted to NASA to supply the International Space Station. It already operates a rocket development facility in McGregor, Texas.
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