I have been living in the Netherlands now for a bit over 3 years. One of the big things that The Netherlands offers to visitors and residents is a large scale of High Quality museums and exhibitions ranging from all kind of topics and walks of life. I have developed a special interest in the more, Science, Geeky and aeronautic oriented museums. I will for my own and other people purposes share a bit of a list and my experience exploring this museums.
The Netherlands has a large European Space Agency center in Noordwijk where they conduct research and manufacturing mostly of Satellites. Part of the compound hosts the Space Expo. Its a relatively small-ish museum but with a lovely curated collection of Space items. We entered for “free” thorugh our MuseumKaart.
If you would like to maintain surprises and skip spoilers stop reading and head over to the museum, I really recommend it. A walk around the museum will take you a decent half day if you look carefully at all the exhibits. I will share now a bit of my experience and what you can expect to find at the museum.
Some of the highlights I found at Space Expo in 2023.
- Satellite Mockups in Life size.
- Soyuz Capsule.
- Spy Satelites.
- Cubesats and picosats.
- Scientific Instrumentation.
- Rocket Engine cut outs.
- Large Scale rocket models.
- Moon Rocks.
- Space Suits.
- Walk in International Space Station Module Simulators.
- Soyus Takeoff simulator.
- A real Arianne launch control station with all LED, buttons, valves.
For me this visit was very special as it was a lot of first times. It was the first time I was standing in a cutout section of an Ariane 1 engine block standing among 4 engines. It was a first time looking directly into objects that have been in space (Soyuz Capsule, Moon Rocks). It was the first time I sit down on a Soyuz simulator and walked into the IIS.
You will be received outside the museum by an Ariane IV Fairing outside and some satellite mockups. The area is quite child friendly with a playground outside and some nice deck and shaded area. Very recommended for families.
Once inside you will get to see a lot of Cube Sats, and scientific instrumentation. The Dutch apparently have a very successful cubesat mission to monitor the quality of the air across the world. This satellite mission is showcased multiple times throughout the museum.
You will later get to explore some Soyuz Capsules. Its amazing to be able to look inside and see all the screen, button, switches and controllers. Much better than the new Dragon capsule with a single touch screen.
You will later come across the Rocket Engine Blocks. This are wonderfull pieces from the Arianne I, and Vulcan. If you follow History you might know all modern Rockets derive from the Original V2 Turbocharged rocket engine. It was quite fun to be able to watch all 4 Arianne Rocket motors installed in the engine block, and look at the cutouts. Its striking how much of the V2 is still there. This motors were flown by ESA for many years and are still been used by several countries. The vulcan although more impressive I was able to make less from it, since the engine design is quite a bit more advanced.
Everyday astronaut and Scott Manley both have a nice video review of this engines and how they work. I’m adding both links in case you want to dig deeper into this engines. I might do a deep dive into Viking 2 in the future.
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