Space News & Blog Articles

Image: Tethered satellites for propulsion without fuel

The James Webb Space Telescope has arrived safely at Pariacabo harbour in French Guiana. ESA in close collaboration with NASA will now prepare this once in a generation mission for its launch on Ariane 5 from Europe’s Spaceport this December.

Video: 00:02:07

The James Webb Space Telescope will be the largest, most powerful telescope ever launched into space.

Webb’s flight into orbit will take place on an Ariane 5 rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana.

Webb is the next great space science observatory, designed to answer outstanding questions about the Universe and to make breakthrough discoveries in all fields of astronomy. Webb will see farther into our origins – from the formation of stars and planets, to the birth of the first galaxies in the early Universe.

During the first month in space, on its way to the second Langrange point (L2), Webb will undergo a complex unfolding sequence. Key steps in this sequence are unfolding Webb’s sunshield – a five-layer, diamond-shaped structure the size of a tennis court – and the iconic 6.5-metre wide mirror, consisting of a honeycomb-like pattern of 18 hexagonal, gold-coated mirror segments.

Working with partners, ESA was responsible for the development and qualification of Ariane 5 adaptations for the Webb mission and for the procurement of the launch service. As well as launch services, ESA contributes to two of the four science instruments (NIRSpec and MIRI), and provides personnel to support mission operations.

Since the Cumbre Vieja volcano began erupting on 19 September 2021, lava has burned through homes, roads and farmlands causing mass destruction on the west part of the Canary Island of La Palma. Satellite imagery has helped authorities monitor and manage the ongoing crisis. From capturing images of the rivers of lava, to measuring gas emissions and assessing damage, the fleet of Copernicus Sentinel satellites have been providing crucial data for local teams.

Kicking off with a bold flourish, Φ-week 2021 promises to bring space even closer to the forefront of addressing society’s biggest challenges, namely issues associated with the climate crisis, while boosting the economy through transformative New Space, artificial intelligence, and quantum and cognitive computing.

The new heart of ESA’s Planetary Defence Office was inaugurated today, heralding a new chapter in the Agency’s work to protect Earth from dangerous near-Earth objects, aka asteroids.

Week in images: 4 - 8 October 2021

Discover our week through the lens

Budapest, the capital and most populous city in Hungary, is visible in this image captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission.

The latest pair of Galileo satellites have touched down at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, ahead of their launch together next month.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has awarded a share of this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics to Klaus Hasselmann in acknowledgment of his contribution to ‘the physical modelling of Earth’s climate, quantifying variability and reliably predicting global warming’. Among Prof. Hasselmann’s long list of outstanding achievements, ESA also recognises him as one of the ‘fathers’ of ESA’s first Earth observation mission, ERS-1, which has been key to understanding our changing planet and which paved the way to modern techniques in observing Earth from space.

Focusing on the New Space economy and innovations in Earth observation, ESA’s fourth Φ-week kicks off on Monday 11 October. Join us live for two of the main sessions: the Opening session on Monday at 10:30 CEST and the Blending New Space Technologies and Services session on Tuesday at 16:00 CEST.

Today ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet became commander of the International Space Station, taking over from Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut and fellow Crew-2 member Akihiko Hoshide. Thomas will hold this role until shortly before Crew-2 return to Earth in November.

Video: 00:02:06

ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet takes you on a tour of the International Space Station like no other. Filmed with a 360 camera, the Space Station 360 series lets you explore for yourself alongside Thomas’s explanation – episode seven is NASA’s Destiny laboratory.

The International Space Station’s fourth module, Destiny, was waunched on 7 February 2001 on Space Shuttle Atlantis. The American module is the heart of the non-Russian part of the Station and allows experiments to be performed in many disciplines, from biology to physics, including a rack for burning liquids in weightlessness and the European Microgravity Science Glovebox.

Follow Thomas: https://blogs.esa.int/exploration/it/category/astronauts/thomas-pesquet/

The video is in French, to activate the English subtitles, click on the CC icon at the bottom right of the YouTube player.

Access the other Space Station 360 videos

Image:

The ESA-owned Short Arm Human Centrifuge has been upgraded, installed and inaugurated at the Olympic Sport Centre Planica facility near Kranjska Gora, Slovenia. Soon to be home to ESA bedrest studies, this recently enhanced clinical research centre will help further scientists’ knowledge of human physiology in space.

Run by the Jozef Stefan Institute on behalf of ESA, bedrest studies at the facility offer scientists a way to see how the human body adapts to weightlessness. This allows researchers to test techniques, known as “countermeasures”, to counteract the negative effects of living in space.

The Short-Arm Human Centrifuge offers an extra suite of possible countermeasures by exposing people to artificial gravity. At 35 revolutions of the 3-m arms per minute, riders may experience a force of gravity that is more than twice their own body weight at their centre of mass, and more than four times their body weight at their feet.

Artificial gravity has the potential to reduce many of the negative effects of weightlessness on the human body in one go. As spinning encourages blood to flow back towards a subject’s feet, they are provided with a force to push against, while they follow a carefully controlled exercise regime of squats, jumps, heel raises and toe raises, for 30 minutes per day. These countermeasures should mitigate the reduction of bone and muscle mass that astronauts, and bedrest subjects, can otherwise experience.

The Planica facility provides equipment to collect all ESA Bedrest Core Data, allowing for comparison between different ESA-sponsored studies.  It can also be maintained under adjustable environmental conditions, such as a low-oxygen atmosphere, which is highly relevant for human exploration missions.

Video: 00:03:50

The European Space Agency is playing a vital role in humankind’s return to the Moon. In a few months NASA will launch Artemis I from the Kennedy Space Center. The uncrewed mission will carry NASA’s Orion spacecraft incorporating ESA’s European Service Module (ESM-1), built and tested by Airbus Bremen, in Germany, with the help of 10 European nations. ESM-1’s main engine and 32 thrusters will propel Orion into orbit around the Moon and return it to Earth.

As Artemis I prepares for launch, the second European Service Module (ESM-2) is about to ship to the US with ESM-3 also currently under construction. The second Artemis mission, however, has a crucial difference: it will carry four astronauts for a lunar flyby. ESM-2 will provide propulsion, power, oxygen, water and life support as well as controlling the temperature in the orbiting crew module. ESM-3 will go one step further and put the first person on the Moon for 50 years. 

This film features soundbites from: Matthias Gronwoski, Chief Engineer Orion ESM, Airbus;  Rachid Amerkrane, Project Manager Orion ESM, Airbus; Philippe Deloo, ESM Programme Manager, ESA.

Learn the latest about the launch of Crew-3 to the International Space Station during two virtual briefings this Wednesday 6 and Thursday 7 October live on ESA Web TV Two.

Image: Visitors with disabilities at ESA Open Day

ESA and Mattel have released a Samantha Cristoforetti Barbie doll to coincide with World Space Week 2021 and its theme of ‘Women in Space’, to help encourage girls to become the next generation of astronauts, engineers and space scientists.

This week marks seven years since the very first satellite that ESA built for the European Union’s Copernicus programme started delivering data to monitor the environment. The Sentinel-1A satellite has shed new light on our changing world and has been key to supplying a wealth of radar imagery to aid disaster response. While this remarkable satellite may have been designed for an operational life of seven years, it is still going strong and fully expected to be in service for several years to come.

Video: 00:01:01

A beautiful sequence of 53 images taken by the monitoring cameras on board the ESA/JAXA BepiColombo mission as the spacecraft made its first close flyby of its destination planet Mercury on 1 October 2021.
The compilation includes images from two of the three Monitoring Cameras (MCAM) onboard the Mercury Transfer Module, which provides black-and-white snapshots at 1024 x 1024 pixel resolution. It is not possible to image with the high-resolution camera suite during the cruise phase. The MCAMs also capture parts of the spacecraft: MCAM-2 sees the medium-gain antenna and magnetometer boom, while the high-gain antenna is in the MCAM-3 field-of-view.

The sequence opens with the closest images acquired by MCAM-2 and MCAM-3, taken at a distance of around 1000 km from the surface of the planet. Closest approach at 199 km took place about five minutes earlier, at 23:34:41 UTC.

During the half hour following the close approach, imaging alternated between the two cameras. In general, MCAM-2 pointed towards the northern hemisphere of Mercury, while MCAM-3 pointed towards the southern hemisphere. Thus the subsequent images show a set of complementary views from each camera in turn, ranging from a distance of about 2420 km to 6140 km from the surface of Mercury. In these relatively close images, it is possible to identify prominent impact craters, scarps, and other geological features that BepiColombo will study in more detail once in orbit around the planet at the end of 2025.

The final part of the compilation illustrates BepiColombo's departure from Mercury as the spacecraft changed attitude along its trajectory, giving the impression Mercury's apparent movement changes direction. The final image was taken at 03:03:49 UTC on 2 October from a distance of approximately 93 thousand kilometres. The final departure sequence has been speeded up by a factor of about 900.

Several different exposure times were used throughout the imaging sequence in order to try and capture the rapidly-varying brightness of Mercury, and in some cases the spacecraft and/or the planet are overexposed, particularly in the final departure sequence. Optical and electronic artefacts are also visible in some images.
The gravity assist manoeuvre was the first at Mercury and the fourth of nine flybys overall. During its seven-year cruise to the smallest and innermost planet of the Solar System, BepiColombo makes one flyby at Earth, two at Venus and six at Mercury to help steer it on course to arrive in Mercury orbit in 2025. The Mercury Transfer Module carries two science orbiters: ESA’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter and JAXA’s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter. They will operate from complementary orbits to study all aspects of mysterious Mercury from its core to surface processes, magnetic field and exosphere, to better understand the origin and evolution of a planet close to its parent star.