Starchaser Industries

If you’re local to the Manchester area you may at some point have seen a truck driving around with a giant space rocket strapped to the back of it.

The truck in question belongs to Steve Bennett, self taught rocket engineer and founder of Starchaser Industries. Steve has been in the rocket launching business for years and is currently in the middle of planning his next launch, Skybolt. Skybolt is part funded by Chester University and is going to be launched into orbit in the autumn.

Steve couldn’t do all of this on his own, he has the help of a small group of enthusiastic and eccentric volunteers. We were lucky enough to spend the afternoon helping out with a bit of rocket building and took these portraits of the starchasers.

Following on from the portrait sessions we followed the team up to Otterburn military base to photograph the launch of Skybolt 2. The rocket is currently the largest to be successfully launched from the UK mainland.