Where in the world do rockets launch from, and why there?

Steps

1. GCAT launch.tsv rows whose LaunchCode is O followed by S or F, joined to sites.tsv on Launch_Site (a trailing question mark removed). A spaceport is the sites.tsv Group when it is set, otherwise UCode. The country is the GCAT launching state of the site with most launches. The rotation speed at a latitude is 2 pi R cos(latitude) / one sidereal day, R = 6378.137 km, day = 86164.09 s.
2. Launch attempts, not payloads or mass: a Starlink launch of 20 satellites and a small rocket with one count the same. The sites are as GCAT groups them; GCAT counts Baikonur under Russia and the Soviet Union, and French Guiana under its own code.

7,173 orbital launch attempts, 45 spaceports, 8 decades, 69 Vandenberg years, 14 latitude rows. Unit: orbital launch attempts; latitude in degrees; speed in km per hour. Every derived figure on this page (changes, indexes, averages, counts) is computed from the published rows, and the table under each chart says how.

Checks

• The GCAT licence wording (CC BY 4.0) is read from the GCAT introduction page and checked by the script, which stops if it changes.
• The yearly attempts from the GCAT file agree with the earlier launches analysis for every year from 1957 to 2025 (the only difference is 1 launch in 2026, added by GCAT since that build); spaceports add up to the attempts, and the decades, the last five years and the Vandenberg series each add up.
• The equator speed (1,674 km per hour) is computed from the radius and the sidereal day and must lie between NASA's 'over 1650' and 1700; the distance to Vandenberg (226 km) is a great-circle distance.
• The NASA, ESA and GCAT pages quoted are fetched and their wording checked by the script (the Soyuz payloads, the downrange and east-coast statements, the Vandenberg statement).

Caveats

• Counts follow GCAT's launch list at its update date, and the newest launches are added as GCAT confirms them. 2026 is partial. A spaceport row joins pads that GCAT groups; GCAT keeps some historic sites apart (the Russian northern site Plesetsk has two codes that are joined here by GCAT's unified code). GCAT's payload mass column is still being filled in and is not used. The free speed from Earth's rotation is the only latitude effect shown; real payload also depends on the orbit, the rocket and range safety, which is why Vandenberg exists despite its higher latitude.
• Launch attempts are not tonnes to orbit: one Falcon 9 or Long March launch may carry one payload or dozens. GCAT's payload mass column is incomplete and is not used.
• Why a site is where it is mixes physics (latitude, direction), safety (what lies downrange) and history; the page shows the first and cites NASA for the second.

Releases and revisions

• GCAT release 1.8.8 (2026 Sep 3), data update 2026 Oct 9; launch list 2026 Oct 9 1759:48
• GCAT updates its launch list as launches are confirmed. Re-run space_launch_sites.py to refresh; it also rewrites the globe layer.