Q&A with Guglielmo Aglietti, RemoveDebris principal investigator (members only)

Europe’s Sentinel 3A satellite, designed for real-time surveys of the world’s oceans, ice sheets, lakes and rivers, is attached to a decommissioned Russian nuclear missile for launch Tuesday. These photos show the spacecraft’s final prelaunch preparations.

A European-built communications satellite has arrived at Cape Canaveral for fueling and final launch preparations ahead of a planned late February liftoff aboard a Falcon 9 rocket with a previously-flown first stage booster.

Ground crews have mounted the fully-fueled Sentinel 2B spacecraft, the next mission in Europe’s multibillion-dollar Copernicus Earth observation satellite fleet, on top of a Vega rocket inside a protective gantry on its launch pad in French Guiana for blastoff next month.