Check out photos of Europe’s Ariane 5 launcher in the starting blocks at its tropical spaceport awaiting liftoff with two commercial television relay stations.
The launch from French Guiana is set for Thursday at 2010 GMT (4:10 p.m. EDT) carrying satellites into orbit for Eutelsat and Intelsat. It will be the 81st flight of an Ariane 5 rocket dating back to 1996.
Photo credit: Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – P. PironPhoto credit: Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – P. PironPhoto credit: Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – P. PironPhoto credit: Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – P. PironPhoto credit: Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – P. PironPhoto credit: Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – P. Piron
Firing off the launch pad with more than a half-million pounds of thrust, a Vega rocket soared into space Monday night from French Guiana with Europe’s Sentinel 2B environmental satellite.
SpaceX and OneWeb — space industry rivals and owners of two of the largest fleets of commercial satellites — are set to add more spacecraft to their internet networks Wednesday with launches from Cape Canaveral and Russia.
Leading all other nations, U.S. launch providers flew 44 missions in 2020 that aimed to place payloads in Earth orbit or deep space, with 40 successes. China followed with 35 successful orbital missions in 39 launch attempts.
