{"id":14464,"date":"2017-07-18T23:54:18","date_gmt":"2017-07-18T15:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/europes-lightweight-vega-launcher-nears-10th-flight\/"},"modified":"2017-07-18T23:54:18","modified_gmt":"2017-07-18T15:54:18","slug":"europes-lightweight-vega-launcher-nears-10th-flight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/europes-lightweight-vega-launcher-nears-10th-flight\/","title":{"rendered":"Europe\u2019s lightweight Vega launcher nears 10th flight"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Vega rocket\u2019s solid-fueled Zefiro 23 second stage was hoisted on top of the launcher\u2019s first stage last month on a launch pad at the Guiana Space Center in Kourou, French Guiana. Credit: ESA\/CNES\/Arianespace \u2013 Photo Optique Video du CSG \u2013 P. Piron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A solid-fueled Vega rocket has been stacked on a launch pad in French Guiana for liftoff Aug. 1 with two Israeli-built satellites \u2014 one developed in partnership with the French space agency for environmental research, and another to gather intelligence for the Italian military.<\/p>\n

The late-night blastoff Aug. 1 will be the 10th flight of a Vega rocket, an Italian-led project crafted to haul small satellites into orbits several hundred miles above Earth.<\/p>\n

Built by a European industrial consortium led by Avio, an Italian aerospace contractor, the Vega booster has found a niche carrying lightweight Earth-viewing satellites into orbit, particularly spacecraft with a European connection.<\/p>\n

All nine Vega flights to date have been successful, lofting payloads into space for the European Space Agency, the European Commission\u2019s Copernicus environmental network, the governments of Vietnam, Kazakhstan, Peru and Turkey, and Terra Bella, a U.S.-based Earth-imaging company backed by Google that was since acquired by Planet.<\/p>\n

The satellite passengers slated to ride the 10th Vega rocket into orbit are Ven\u00b5s, a 582-pound (264-kilogram) spacecraft designed to monitor plant growth, and Optsat 3000, a sharp-eyed 811-pound (368-kilogram) reconnaissance satellite fitted with an optical telescope looking down on Earth.<\/p>\n

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The Vega rocket\u2019s fourth stage was lifted onto the launch pad June 29. Credit: ESA\/CNES\/Arianespace \u2013 Photo Optique Video du CSG \u2013 S. Martin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Optsat 3000 will ride in the upper position inside the Vega\u2019s Swiss-made payload fairing, and Ven\u00b5s will launch in the rocket\u2019s lower payload berth. Both satellites were manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries.<\/p>\n

Liftoff is set for 10:58:33 p.m. French Guiana time Aug. 1 (9:58:33 p.m. EDT; 0158:33 GMT on Aug. 2). After a boost into space by the Vega\u2019s three lower Italian-made solid motors, a liquid-fueled upper stage engine sourced from Ukraine will steer the Optsat 3000 and Ven\u00b5s satellites into sun-synchronous polar orbits several hundred miles above Earth.<\/p>\n

Optsat 3000, the bigger of the mission\u2019s two passengers, will separate from the launcher first around 42 minutes after liftoff. The Ven\u00b5s spacecraft will deploy from the Vega rocket\u2019s upper stage around T+plus 1 hour, 37 minutes.<\/p>\n

Italy\u2019s first optical surveillance satellite, joining a fleet of Italian radar imaging craft already in orbit. The $182 million satellite, designed for a lifetime of at least six years, carries a Jupiter remote sensing camera provided by Israel-based Elbit Systems Ltd. capable of resolving objects on the ground smaller than a half-meter (20 inches).<\/p>\n

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The Optsat 3000 satellite was removed from its shipping container June 22 after arriving in French Guiana from Israel. Credit: ESA\/CNES\/Arianespace \u2013 Photo Optique Video du CSG \u2013 P. Baudon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Italian Ministry of Defense ordered the Optsat 3000 satellite from Israel Aerospace Industries as part of a reciprocal contract arrangement, in exchange for the Israeli military\u2019s purchase of Italian-made jet trainers.<\/p>\n

Telespazio acts as prime contractor for the Optsat 3000 program, and OHB Italy reserved the satellite\u2019s launch on a Vega rocket with Arianespace.<\/p>\n

The Ven\u00b5s spacecraft is setting off on a dual scientific and technology demonstration mission.<\/p>\n

Fitted with a French-supplied \u201csuper-spectral\u201d color camera sensitive in 12 bands ranging from blue to near-infrared, Ven\u00b5s will take pictures of vegetation, glaciers, coastlines and other features from a perch 447 miles (720 kilometers) above Earth.<\/p>\n

Scientists will point Ven\u00b5s\u2019s camera toward more than 100 pre-identified areas of interest in forests, croplands and nature reserves around the world, according to CNES, the French space agency. No other satellite currently in orbit can survey the same locations with the resolution and frequency of the Ven\u00b5s mission, a benefit gained at the expense of global coverage, officials said.<\/p>\n

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Technicians work on the Ven\u00b5s spacecraft June 29 at the Guiana Space Center, soon after its delivery from Israel. Credit: ESA\/CNES\/Arianespace \u2013 Photo Optique Video du CSG \u2013 P. Baudon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Researchers will track plant growth, snow cover, glacial movements, and sediments in coastal estuaries with the Ven\u00b5s satellite. Scientists will analyze the mission\u2019s data output to study how environmental and human factors influence vegetation health.<\/p>\n

The Ven\u00b5s project is a partnership between CNES and the Israel Space Agency. Besides the satellite\u2019s primary camera, France is in charge of the mission\u2019s science data center and other ground systems. Israeli engineers built the satellite, the camera\u2019s telescope and a experimental plasma thruster to be tested in the second phase of the Ven\u00b5s mission.<\/p>\n

After a two-and-a-half-year Earth observation campaign, Ven\u00b5s\u2019s altitude will be lowered to approximately 250 miles (410 kilometers) to test the low-power electric thruster\u2019s ability to counteract the effect of atmospheric drag and maintain the satellite\u2019s orbit.<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Vega rocket\u2019s solid-fueled Zefiro 23 second stage was hoisted on top of the launcher\u2019s first stage last month on a launch pad at the Guiana Space Center in Kourou, French Guiana. Credit: ESA\/CNES\/Arianespace \u2013 Photo Optique Video du CSG \u2013 P. Piron A solid-fueled Vega rocket has been stacked on a launch pad in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[498,1244,690,159,2185,1775,242,1773],"class_list":["post-14464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-arianespace","tag-avio","tag-cnes","tag-earth-observation","tag-elbit","tag-electric-propulsion","tag-france","tag-guiana-space-center"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14464"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14464\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}