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The debut launch was originally targeting 2007, as the upper stage passed vibration testing in Holland, ahead of the Critical Design Review (CDR). This date continued to slip year on year, including recently, ahead of the approved February 13 target.<\/p>\n
Confirming the date, the new launcher passed its final hurdle on Saturday at Europe\u2019s Spaceport, as the Launch Readiness Review (LRR), pass the vehicle for launch.<\/p>\n
This last review checked the final status of the entire launch system, including the vehicle and the ground infrastructure, following the full dress rehearsal of the countdown and launch. Earlier, all four stages underwent final acceptance, including the testing of the avionics, guidance, telemetry, propulsion, separation pyrotechnics and safety systems.<\/p>\n
The first mission, designated VV01 per Arianespace\u2019s system, was scheduled for liftoff during a three-hour launch window lasting 10:00-13:00 GMT. A nominal countdown resulted in launch at the start of the window.<\/p>\n
NASA mission updates
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Flight VV01 departed from the new Vega launch site carrying nine satellites into orbit. This is one of Vega\u2019s strengths, as \u2013 unlike other small launchers \u2013 the vehicle is able to place multiple payloads into orbit. In particular, it offers configurations able to handle payloads ranging from a single satellite up to one main satellite plus six microsatellites.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Z58.jpg\" "\\"Z5\\"")
Vega is compatible with payload masses ranging from 300 kg to 2500 kg, depending on the type and altitude of the orbit required by the customers. The benchmark is for 1500 kg into a 700 km-altitude polar orbit.<\/p>\nThe payload consists of two Italian satellites \u2013 ASI\u2019s LARES laser relativity satellite and the University of Bologna\u2019s ALMASat-1 \u2013 as well as seven picosatellites provided by European universities: e-Star (Italy), Goliat (Romania), MaSat-1 (Hungary), PW-Sat (Poland), Robusta (France), UniCubeSat GG (Italy) and Xatcobeo (Spain).<\/p>\n
The flight is qualifying the overall Vega system, including the vehicle, the ground infrastructure and operations, from the launch campaign to the payload separation and disposal of the upper module. In particular, it demonstrated the vehicle\u2019s performance and payload services.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Z49.jpg\" "\\"Z4\\"")
Vega\u2019s P80 advanced solid propellant motor first stage motor also underwent a static fire test in Kourou in 2006. This stage features a novel filament-wound casing structure \u2013 utilizing new-generation, high-quality production techniques.<\/p>\nThe second and third stages \u2013 designated Zefiro 23 and Zefiro 9, respectively \u2013 also use solid propellant motors, while the launcher is topped off by the bi-propellant liquid upper stage (called AVUM \u2013 Attitude and Vernier Upper Module). Test firings of these motors took place between 2008 and 2009.<\/p>\n
With the countdown proceeding without incident, Vega\u2019s P80 solid-propellant engine ignited first and a fraction of a second later the vehicle lifted off, jumping off the pad with impressive speed. It burned out and separated at 1 min 54 sec. The Zefiro-23 second stage then ignited one second later and was jettisoned 3 min 22 sec into the flight.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Z311.jpg\" "\\"Z3\\"")
About 16 seconds later, the Zefiro-9 third stage ignited. The fairing protecting the payload during the climb through Earth\u2019s atmosphere was discarded at 3 min 43 sec, followed by Zefiro-9 separation at 5 min 47 sec.<\/p>\nThe first firing of the AVUM liquid-propellant fourth stage began at 5 min 54 sec; the second burn was conducted at 48 min 7 sec.<\/p>\n
At 55 min 5 sec into the flight, Italy\u2019s LARES laser-ranging satellite separated from the upper stage.<\/p>\n
AVUM\u2019s third burn began at 66 min 10 sec, followed by the separation of ALMaSat-1 and the seven CubeSats at 70 min 35 sec. Vega\u2019s flight was completed 81 min after first-stage ignition.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Z69.jpg\" "\\"Z6\\"")
The mission is intended to qualify the overall Vega system, including the vehicle itself, its launch infrastructure and the operations, from the launch campaign to the payload separation and safe disposal of the upper stage.<\/p>\nFollowing this qualification flight, the Vega launch system will be handed over to Arianespace to operate. The company will also be in charge of offering this new launch capacity on the international market, with the goal of at least two missions per year. ESA will be an early customer of Arianespace\u2019s new service through a commitment for five launches.<\/p>\n
ESA and Arianespace having already ordered four new launchers, amid studies for the launch of the LISA Pathfinder mission. The order complements the purchase of a first launcher in an agreement signed last year within the framework of the Verta contract, covering the five launches that follow Vega\u2019s qualification flight.<\/p>\n
The studies for the launch of the LISA Pathfinder scientific satellite of ESA, using a Vega launcher from the Verta batch, started at the end of September. The mission is scheduled for a launch window from October 2013 to September 2014.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/Z431.jpg\" "\\"Z43\\"")
Vega will also carry out the launch of ESA\u2019s IXV (Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle), which is now into a detailed planning stage, a major step towards the spacecraft\u2019s projected 2014 flight. (L2 Link to 15 Presentations on IXV)<\/p>\nLaunched into a suborbital trajectory from Kourou, the IXV will return to Earth as if from a low-orbit mission, allowing for the testing and qualification of new critical technologies for future reentry vehicle concepts.<\/p>\n
During it mission, the vehicle will aim for an altitude of around 450 km, allowing it to reach a velocity of 7.5 km\/s on entering the atmosphere and will collect a large amount of data during its hypersonic and supersonic flight, while it is being controlled by thrusters and aerodynamic flaps.<\/p>\n
IXV will then descend by parachute and land in the Pacific Ocean to await recovery and analysis.<\/p>\n
This was the debut launch of the third vehicle in Arianespace\u2019s family of launchers which includes the heavy Ariane 5, and the medium lift Soyuz.<\/p>\n
(Images via Arianespace, ESA, L2)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Europe has given birth to a new launch vehicle early on Monday, as Arianespace successfuly conducted the debut launch of their Vega rocket. The qualification flight lifted off at the start of a three hour launch window, which opened at 10:00 GMT. Vega carried a total of nine satellites from launch pad ELA-1 at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30351,"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":[498,1311],"class_list":["post-40204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-arianespace","tag-vega"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40204"}],"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=40204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}