European Space Agency – Page 17

Live coverage: Ariane 5 launches from French Guiana

July 25, 2018 Stephen Clark

An Ariane 5 rocket and four Galileo navigation satellites launched from French Guiana at 1125 GMT (7:25 a.m. EDT), beginning a four-hour climb into orbit more than 14,000 miles above Earth.

Photos: Ariane 5 rocket rolls to launch with four Galileo satellites

July 24, 2018 Stephen Clark

An Ariane 5 rocket emerged from its vertical assembly building Monday and rolled along dual rail tracks for a 1.7-mile (2.7-kilometer) journey to its launch pad at the Guiana Space Center on the northern coastline of South America, moving into position for blastoff Wednesday with four Galileo navigation satellites.

Ariane 5 rocket, Galileo satellites on launch pad in French Guiana

July 24, 2018 Stephen Clark

Ground crews in French Guiana on Monday transferred an Ariane 5 rocket to its launch pad, moving the vehicle into position for liftoff Wednesday with four European Galileo navigation satellites on the Ariane 5’s last flight with an older-generation, out-of-production upper stage.

Powerful new European solid-fueled rocket motor aces first test-firing

July 16, 2018 Stephen Clark

European engineers test-fired the world’s most powerful present-day single-segment solid rocket booster Monday in French Guiana, clearing a major development hurdle for the Vega-C and Ariane 6 launchers set for debuts in 2019 and 2020.

Arianespace aims for busy second half of 2018

July 3, 2018 Stephen Clark

Europe’s first mission to Mercury, a quartet of Galileo navigation spacecraft, the world’s first global winds observatory, and a new European weather satellite have arrived at an equatorial launch base in French Guiana in preparation for launches in the coming months.

Webb’s launch delayed to 2021 at an extra cost of nearly $1 billion

June 27, 2018 Stephen Clark

An independent panel has informed NASA that the James Webb Space Telescope will not be ready for launch until March 2021, and Congress will have to reauthorize the long-delayed, over-budget mission after breaching an $8 billion cost cap, officials said Wednesday.

Soyuz delivers crew of three to International Space Station

June 8, 2018 William Harwood

Two days after launch from Kazakhstan, a Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying a crew of three wrapped up a problem-free rendezvous Friday, docking at the International Space Station’s Earth-facing Rassvet port less than a week after three other crew members departed.

Video: Soyuz lifts off, beams down on-board camera views

June 6, 2018 Stephen Clark

A three-person crew heading for the International Space Station took off Wednesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and arrived in orbit around nine minutes later, beginning a two-day pursuit of the research outpost.

U.S.-Russian-German crew launched to space station

June 6, 2018 William Harwood

Three days after a trio of space station fliers returned to Earth, a Russian cosmonaut, a German flight engineer and a NASA physician-astronaut rocketed into orbit aboard another Soyuz spacecraft Wednesday, setting off after the lab complex in the first step of a two-day rendezvous.

Live coverage: Soyuz crew docks with International Space Station

June 6, 2018 Stephen Clark

Two days after launching from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, three new crew members arrived Friday at the International Space Station to begin a six-month stay. Docking of the crew’s Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft to the station’s Rassvet module occurred at 9:01 a.m. EDT (1301 GMT).