CBC News reported on Friday, March 1 that the David Florida Laboratory will close by the end of March 2025. The storied facility has seen its share of important projects, but its closure does provide commercial alternatives an opportunity to expand.
SpaceQ contacted the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) for more information on the closure. Since the David Florida Laboratory (DFL) is still active serving the CSA and others, we asked what facility the CSA would use going forward. The CSA responded that the “DFL will be moving towards a wind-down posture over the next several months, allowing the DFL’s clientele and the Canadian space sector to make alternate arrangements for testing services.”
Alternative arrangements would likely mean a combination of commercial and other public alternatives. And this was hinted in the statement the CSA provided us. “The Canadian Space Agency remains committed to working closely with industry to help unlock the full potential of Canada’s space sector and respond to the realities of the new and growing space market.”
The move comes as a result of a shifting industry where satellites are much smaller, commercial options are available and testing in-house by some organizations has been growing.
Like other government departments, the CSA was tasked last summer with cutting expenses. The agency added in its response to SpaceQ said “expenditure reviews are an integral part of sound and responsible management. The difficult decision to cease DFL operations is based on the strategic review of operations.”
The move means that Ottawa based Space Simulation Services of Canada, a smaller commercial alternative, will see an increase in business. Michael Graham, founder and CEO said as much to SpaceQ and added that “we’ll be looking to add the scale capability that DFL had.” He also stated that one advantage his company has is that they’ve “also developed the mobile facility which shows up to our clients door and provides fast internal capability addition.”
He noted that organizations such as the Space Flight Laboratory and the Consortium for Research and Innovation in Aerospace in Québec (CRIAQ) have many of the capabilities DFL has, calling them “one stop shop(s).” He also mentioned the new Centre for Advanced Research and Training in Aviation, Mobility and Space (CARTAMS) will play role as a hub “for all of the various space ecosystems across Canada.”
For Larry Reeves of the Canadian Satellite Design Challenge Management Society (CSDCMS), the news came as a surprise. “I was quite saddened, disappointed at the news” and added” that is an excellent world-class facility which certainly inspired (and helped) a lot of CSDC participants to pursue space careers. Given the growth in space industry in the past ten years, and the projected growth, I think Canada needs a facility like DFL to help students and Canadian companies develop.” As a not-for-profit the CSDCMS funds are limited and relies on in-kind support and some corporate sponsorships.
Reeves added that their organizations student “CSDC (CubeSat Design Challenge) only did vibration testing” at DFL. He also said they “had ideas of trying to do TVAC testing as well. Hopefully we’ll be able to find another facility in which we can continue doing that, but I think there are only commercial facilities – that might be a lot to ask of a company.”
SpaceQ also contacted MDA asking them what their plans were. Among the projects MDA used the DFL for was the high-profile RADARSAT Constellation Mission (RCM). While MDA acknowledged our request, the person responsible was not available by publication time to provide us a statement. We’ll update our story as needed.