Awarua based Space Operations NZ (SpaceOp NZ) has announced it has expanded its operations at Spark’s Warkworth Satellite Earth Station, with the takeover on 3rd July of Auckland University of Technology's (AUT) radio astronomy operations.

All AUT staff at the station will now join the SpaceOps NZ team. 

SpaceOp NZ CEO Robin McNeill said the AUT operation used a 12 metre antenna to pinpoint New Zealand, to within a couple of millimetres, by tuning into radio waves from distant objects in the universe.

SpaceOp NZ's Awarua operations. Photo: Allen Niwa, NIWA

SpaceOp NZ currently uses a 30 metre Spark antenna at the Warkworth site to map the South Spiral Arm of the Milky Way.

The 30 metre antenna would now also be used to communicate with spacecraft in deep space including some at the very outer limits of our solar system, McNeill said.

Established in 2008, SpaceOps NZ is best known to Southlanders for it’s Awarua ground station facilities, where it provides telecommunications to spacecraft orbiting 400 to 600 kilometres above the Earth.

McNeill said he acknowledged the tremendous work done by AUT academic and technical staff since the AUT radio astronomy operations began at Warkworth in 2008.