Q&A with Josef Aschbacher, director of ESA’s Earth observation programs (members only)

Five commercial Chinese satellites carrying video and hyperspectral imaging sensors took off Thursday aboard a Long March 11 booster.

A powerful European Ariane 5 rocket blasted off from French Guiana late Friday and boosted a pair of satellites into space for a seven-year plunge into the inner solar system, a voyage requiring seven planetary flybys to slow down enough in the sun’s gravitational clutches to slip into orbit around hellish Mercury.

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.