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Brisbane-based startup Stratoship has surpassed its expectations after running a successful 11-hour test flight of its high-altitude airship, marking a key step toward long-duration stratospheric missions.
The company successfully completed the test flight on Monday, 5 May, with the airship spending eight of the 11 hours in the stratosphere, which was roughly 19km above the ground.
The airship was launched in central west Queensland out of Corfield Racecourse - about 85km from the outback town of Winton – at 7:55am, reaching the stratosphere around 9am and maintaining that altitude until 5:45pm, eventually landing just past 7pm.
Founded in 2020 by Daniel Field, Stratoship develops high-altitude balloon flights that are suitable for payload testing, research or data collection or proof of concept validation.
The startup is testing its propulsion, control system and persistence in the stratosphere, offering companies up to 10kg of payload, which could be cameras, sensors or communication devices, on rideshare flights.
"Our flight on May 5th lasted more than 11 hours, including eight hours in the stratosphere, which exceeded our expectations for this flight," said Stratoship founder, managing director and engineering lead Daniel Field.
"Our roadmap to multi-day flights includes use cases for communications, observation - even fire detection."
Unlike traditional satellites that only provide intermittent coverage as they orbit, Stratoship's platform can remain fixed over designated areas, delivering consistent monitoring and communications. The airship is payload agnostic, accommodating various sensors and communications equipment based on specific mission requirements.
Stratoship’s technology operates at altitudes of 20 kilometres – twice the height of commercial airliners – and offers organisations real-time data and communications capabilities for targeted areas, one example being bushfires.
According to Australia’s 2024 National Defence Strategy, space capabilities are “equally important” as maritime, land and air domains, despite the majority of Australian satellite data coming from the US, Europe and Japan.
Stratoship hopes its technology will help address concerns raised by space governance experts about Australia’s reliance on foreign partners for space-based services in areas such as disaster response, agriculture and regional connectivity.
"While we're still in early engineering development, our recent flight success validates our core design principles," Field added.
"We're particularly focused on ensuring gas-tight manufacturing to minimise helium escape, which is crucial for extending stratospheric endurance toward our multi-day operational goals."
The Stratoship platform has been developed with the support of the Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Hub’s Defence Technology Accelerator.
"Innovation shown by companies like Stratoship is essential for Australia," said ARM Hub CEO Cori Stewart.
"Developing, commercialising and scaling breakthrough ideas for global success is how we build sovereign capability, create high-value jobs, and ensure a future-ready industrial economy."
Gilmour Space Technologies delays launch of TestFlight1
Another local startup aiming for the skies is Brisbane-based Gilmour Space Technologies, which today announced it has postponed the launch of its Eris rocket due to an electrical fault in the nose cone.
The rocket, which can carry up to 305kg into Lower Earth Orbit (LEO), has been safely returned to the Vehicle Assembly Building, with the team having begun to analyse the data to fully understand the cause of the electrical fault. The issue was identified before any fuel was loaded into the rocket.
A replacement payload from Gilmour’s Gold Coast manufacturing facility will be transported to the Bowen launch site in the coming days.
The current test campaign has been put on hold, with the launch delayed by at least a few weeks. A new target launch window will be announced once the date is confirmed.
“Our team encountered the issue before fuelling and liftoff, which is exactly what ground testing is meant to do,” Gilmour Space CEO Adam Gilmour said.
“The good news is our team and rocket are both fine. While we're disappointed by the delay, we’re already working through a resolution and expect to be back on the pad soon.”
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