The Sir Arthur Clarke Award is a British award given in recognition of notable contributions to space exploration, particularly British achievements. It was devised by Dave Wright and Jerry Stone [1] and is independent of and separate from awards given by the Arthur C. Clarke Foundation. Founded in 2005, the awards are an annual event. They originally took place at the UK Space Conference. Formerly the British Rocketry Oral History Programme (BROHP) until it was renamed in 2008, this event was held annually at Charterhouse School from 1998 to 2010. In 2011 it was held at the University of Warwick. Nominations for the awards are made by members of the public, with shortlists drawn up by a panel of judges, who also choose the winner. The award was established with the permission of Sir Arthur Clarke, who also chose a special award independently of the public nominations prior to his death on 18 March 2008.
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The award has the same proportions (1:4:9) as the monolith featured in Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey, and is made of glass. It features the diagram Clarke drew in 1945 in order to demonstrate how satellites can provide global communications around the Earth from geostationary orbit, also called the Clarke Orbit. It was co-designed by Jerry Stone and Howard Berry.
Not all categories are awarded each year; 2008 was the first year in which nominations were shortlisted in the category of Best Film Presentation. An additional award was given in 2007 and 2008 that was named after and presented by George Abbey, the former director of the Johnson Space Center. It was awarded to those "whose space achievement made us laugh the most".
The award ceremony is similar to the Oscars in that multiple awards are given in various categories at the same event, which is different from other awards given in the field. As a result, the awards have been referred to as the Arthurs and are known as the Space equivalent of the Oscars. The awards are held in high regard by the international Space community:
The Sir Arthur Clarke Awards are held in great esteem and it is a huge honour to have been nominated. It was a fantastic surprise when we heard the news and we are very flattered.
This award is very nice... I thank all of you for this grand night and this grand award.
2016
The 2016 awards were presented at a gala dinner at the 2016 Reinventing Space Conference at The Royal Society on Thursday 27 October 2016. The event was sponsored by the UK Space Agency.
2015
The 2015 awards were presented at the UK Space Conference Dinner in St George’s Hall, Liverpool on Tuesday 14 July 2015. They were sponsored by the UK Space Agency.
2014
The Sir Arthur Clarke Awards 2014 were presented at an event at The Royal Aeronautical Society on Wednesday 8 October 2014, by the Chief Executive of the UK Space Agency, Dr David Parker.
The specific ESA/Industry Rosetta team members who received the "Space Achievement - Industry/Project Team" award:
2013
The 2013 awards were presented at the UK Space Conference at the Glasgow Science Centre, at a black tie dinner on 16 July hosted by Helen Keen. Tim Peake, the UK's ESA astronaut presented the awards to the recipients.
2012
As the UK Space Agency are only planning to run the space conference in alternate years, the 2012 awards were presented at a special event in the Cholmondeley Room at the House of Lords on 26 October 2012. The host was Lord Cobbold and the MC for the event was the impressionist Jon Culshaw.
2011
The 2011 award took place at the UK Space Conference at the University of Warwick in July 2011.
2010
The award dinner was held on 27 March 2010 at the UK Space Conference at Charterhouse.
2009
The 2009 Awards dinner was held on 4 April 2009 at the UK Space conference.
Inspiration Award || Lord Drayson
2008
The 2008 Awards dinner was held on 29 March 2008 at Charterhouse. Special guests were George Abbey and Joe Engle.
2007
The 2007 Awards dinner was held on 14 April 2007 at the BROHP conference at Charterhouse.
Among the other nominees were Anousheh Ansari, and the British-born astronaut Piers Sellers.
2006
The 2006 Awards dinner was held on 8 April 2006 at the BROHP conference at Charterhouse.
Among the other nominees were Sir Richard Branson, and the Robson Green drama television series Rocket Man.
2005
Presented at the inaugural awards dinner at Charterhouse, Saturday 2 April 2005.
Sir Arthur was also presented with a special award commemorating the 60th anniversary of his paper on global communication by satellite in the October 1945 edition of Wireless World. This award was accepted on behalf of Sir Arthur by his brother Fred.