as Europe tries for the second time to fly its super-rocket - the "10-tonne" Ariane 5-ECA.Posted on 02/12/2005 10:30:45 AM PST by LibWhacker
The satellite industry will hold its breath on Saturday as Europe tries for the second time to fly its super-rocket - the "10-tonne" Ariane 5-ECA.
The 50m-high (160ft) vehicle exploded four minutes into its first mission in 2002, destroying a telecoms payload valued at 600 million euros (£410m).
Rocket operator Arianespace believes it has fixed the cause of the failure and is betting its future on the ECA.
The vehicle is set to become Europe's primary launcher in the decade ahead.
Lift-off from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana is timed for a launch window that runs from 1949 to 2110GMT.
The ECA will carry two satellites: the Spanish XTAR-EUR military communications payload and an experimental spacecraft, called SloshSat, which will study how fluids behave in orbit.
Equipment to monitor and report back on the performance of the launch will also take the ride into space. The total payload mass comes to more than 8.3 tonnes.
This is a little shy of the designed capacity of the ECA which should be capable of putting 10 tonnes into a geostationary transfer orbit.
More thrust
Arianespace does not expect single spacecraft of this mass to be regular passengers in the future; rather multiple payloads will book launches on the vehicle, substantially reducing costs for satellite owners.
The European rocket company has enjoyed dominance in the commercial launch sector and a successful ECA flight will further strengthen its position.
"Ariane 5-ECA will be the workhorse of our company, and of the European space industry as well, for the next 10 years," Arianespace's chief Jean Yves Le-Gall told the BBC's World Business Report.
"So this launch is very important."
He added: "We are now on a level playing field with our competitors, which are mainly US companies."
Another failure, though, and confidence will be shaken in an industry that has endured a difficult downturn in recent years and which has only just begun to look towards a brighter business future.
The Ariane 5-ECA is an altogether more powerful launch vehicle than its predecessor - the Ariane 5-Generic.
Its two solid boosters carry more propellant and there is more thrust from a new cryogenic upper stage.
There is a updated version, too, of the Vulcain engine on the main cryogenic stage.
However, this was the part of the new launcher that failed two years ago on the maiden flight. The inquiry board that looked into the accident identified the probable cause as a leak in the Vulcain nozzle's cooling circuit.
This caused the nozzle to deform and sent the ECA off course; a self-destruct mechanism brought the rocket down far out at sea.
Modifications have since been made to the nozzle design and stringent testing suggests there should be no repeat of the problem on Saturday.
At lift-off, it is calculated that the 780-tonne ECA will be producing 13,000 kiloNewtons of thrust, and at maximum velocity, some 640km (400 miles) above the Earth, its upper stage will be travelling at more than 9km/s (5.5 miles/s).
The US company Boeing recently launched its biggest-lift rocket - the Delta 4-Heavy, which has the capability to put 13 tonnes of payload into a geostationary transfer orbit.
However, the Boeing vehicle is not currently being offered to the commercial satellite sector and is being reserved for US military work.
It's got a purty pink umbilical tower.
Meanwhile, the EU has yet to make a manned spacecraft, much less land a person on the moon.
Yeah, but would *you* want to ride on a French-made rocket? Didn't think so.
I never said I was a fan of the european space program. Just pointing our how far they are behind us.
Possible interest ping.
Bring back the Saturn V.
"However, the Boeing vehicle is not currently being offered to the commercial satellite sector and is being reserved for US military work."
13 tonnes of 4" resolution, synthetic aperture snooping.
Nothing beat US extra-terrestrial intel assets, and u need a powerful lift to get 'em up there.
WAtch it now, live at http://www.arianespace.com/site/index2.html
We are decades behind because NASA built a political ship, the Shuttle, which was designed to be built in as many congressional districts as possible, and was overly complicated overbudget and unsafe.
The ESA has never focused on building a manned rocket, just good rockets.
Its good that someone is building a heavy lift rocket, just wish that the Energiya was still flying.
Server seems to be swamped. NASA TV doesn't have it, either, last time I checked . . . *sigh* . . .
This caused the nozzle to deform...
"...heh-heh...heh-heh-heh...deformed...heh-heh...heh-heh-heh...nozzle...heh-heh...heh-heh-heh..."
Thanks PF.
And it's powered by 1,100,000 of these:
Dang! I hate when that happens. Of course we have experience a few of those ourselves.
In other words, a typical government project.
Bah.
The Saturn V would send 40 tons to the moon.
Too bad NASA destroyed all drawings and tooling for it when the Shuttle came along.
Why did NASA destroy that? They should have preserved the plans.
They wanted to guarantee there'd be no "giving up" on the Shuttle and going back to the Saturn V.
Did the engineers there think they were still working on the Avro Arrow?
(Not to Americans- the Arrow, built in Toronto in the late 1950s, was the most advanced jet fighter of the time and its performance is still just barely matched by the newest fighters of today. When the project was cancelled the prototypes were dismantled and sold as scrap and all blueprints were destroyed.)
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