European Space Agency
The European Space Agency is an intergovernmental organization of 22 member states dedicated to the exploration of space. Established in 1975 and headquartered in Paris, ESA has a worldwide staff of about 2,200
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Surpassing scientific expectations and exceeding its planned life in orbit, the Aeolus wind mission has been hailed as one of ESA’s most successful Earth observation missions. And now, its end will go down in history too, thanks to the ingenuity of the Agency’s mission control team who guided this remarkable satellite down to Earth’s atmosphere for a safe reentry. View the full article
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Image: Aeolus control team wraps up successful reentry operations View the full article
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Week in images: 24-28 July 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article
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Video: 00:01:47 In the month after its launch on 1 July, Euclid has travelled 1.5 million kilometres from Earth towards the Sun-Earth Lagrange point L2, meaning it has ‘arrived’ at its destination orbit. This animation showcases the orbits of Euclid (green), the James Webb Space Telescope (blue), and the Gaia mission (yellow) around this unique position in space. The positions of the spacecraft in this animation don’t correspond to their current positions in space. Located about 1.5 million kilometres from Earth in the opposite direction from the Sun, L2 is about four times further away than our Moon. Several other space missions like Webb and Gaia also orbit L2 a…
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Image: The Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission takes us over the Río de la Plata estuary between Argentina and Uruguay. View the full article
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Image: Astronaut Andreas Mogensen undergoing VR training for EVA emergencies View the full article
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When astronauts return to the Moon they will be bringing along a new generation of spacesuits, designed to withstand the harsh conditions of the lunar surface. But in keeping their human occupants safe and comfortable, these suits might also become a fertile environment for harmful microbial life – especially as astronauts will potentially be sharing suits with one another. View the full article
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Aeolus reentry - LIVE Get rolling updates on the Aeolus reentry, on the Rocket Science blog View the full article
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Video: 00:46:24 On Tuesday 25 July, the four crew members of Crew-7, Jasmin Moghbeli (NASA), Andreas Mogensen (ESA), Satoshi Furukawa (JAXA) and Konstantin Borisov (Roscosmos) hosted a news conference where they talk about their upcoming mission to the International Space Station. View the full article
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Image: Webb snaps detailed infrared image of actively forming stars View the full article
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Video: 00:02:42 After a remarkable life in orbit, Aeolus is out of fuel and out of time – it’s returning to Earth this week. Planned and built before any regulations were put in place on ‘end-of-life’ disposal, the Earth Explorer was designed to naturally return through our atmosphere. After months of detailed planning and analysis, ESA together with industrial partners has designed a complex and never-before-performed set of manoeuvres to control, as much as possible, Aeolus’ fall. The assisted reentry attempt is built on four main phases, now begun at ESA’s mission control: Phase I: once Aeolus has fallen naturally to 280 km, the first manoeuvre is performe…
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On 10 July 2023, a volcano some 30 km from Iceland’s capital, Reykjavik, erupted following heightened seismic activity in the area. Satellites orbiting above us have captured the molten lava and smoke plume puffing from the Litli-Hrútur volcano. View the full article
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Astronaut Frank Rubio aboard the International Space Station collaborated with a small team of robots on Earth to accomplish a complex task – a first test of a new approach to combine human and robotic capabilities for our return to the Moon and beyond. View the full article
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Satellites will soon be used to keep an independent eye on airborne planes, under a deal agreed between ESA and Spire Global, a company that provides space-based data, analytics and space services. View the full article
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Globally, more than 70% of the freshwater withdrawn from Earth’s surface or from underground is used to irrigate crops. The need to produce more food for a growing population against the backdrop of climate change is challenging enough, but satellites reveal that extracting water doesn’t just affect the local environment – there are knock-on consequences for many aspects of the Earth system. View the full article
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Teams preparing Ariane 6 for its inaugural flight successfully completed for the first time a launcher preparation and countdown sequence, on 18 July at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. View the full article
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New measurements by the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope’s Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) has detected water vapour in the inner disc of the system PDS 70, located 370 light-years away. This is the first detection of water in the terrestrial region of a disc already known to host two or more protoplanets. View the full article
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Image: Rhodes wildfire forces thousands to flee View the full article
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Image: New Galileo station goes on duty View the full article
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Week in images: 17-21 July 2023 Discover our week through the lens View the full article
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Video: 00:05:00 ESA’s wind mission Aeolus is coming home. After five years of improving weather forecasts, the satellite will return in a first-of-its-kind assisted reentry. At ESA’s Space Operations Centre in Germany, mission control will use the satellite’s remaining fuel to steer Aeolus during its return to Earth. Find out more about the mission, its successes and how Aeolus is paving the way for safe reentries. View the full article
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Image: This Copernicus Sentinel-2 image highlights the colours of autumn over the southern part of New York state in the US. View the full article
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Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/ Hubble Space Telescope’s extraordinary sensitivity have discovered a swarm of boulders that were possibly shaken off the asteroid Dimorphos when NASA deliberately slammed the half-tonne DART impactor spacecraft into Dimorphos at approximately 22 500 kilometres per hour. DART intentionally impacted Dimorphos on 26 September 2022, slightly changing the trajectory of its orbit around the larger asteroid Didymos. View the full article
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Image: 3D-printed bend-based mechanism View the full article
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The Italian region of Emilia-Romagna was devastated by severe floods in May 2023, claiming lives and displacing thousands of people, resulting in an estimated €8.8 billion in damages. With the region still grappling with the aftermath, satellites have been instrumental in assessing the damages of the affected areas. View the full article
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