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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Image: BepiColombo skims past Venus View the full article
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Video: 00:03:21 Meet bag, bottle and straw, three bits of plastic left on the beach. They are only small, but they are heading into the ocean, where they could cause big damage. ESA is exploring how satellites can help detect and reduce plastic pollution in the ocean. From spotting build-ups of marine litter to tracking ocean currents, satellites could be game-changing in tackling this enormous environmental problem. Though engaging for children and adults alike, this video is designed with 8–12-year-olds in mind. In particular, teachers can use it to introduce the topic of marine litter in subjects such as geography and science. A Dutch version will be available …
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Video: 00:09:41 The International Space Station Expedition 65 crew recorded themselves on a day off after a long week of work having some weightless fun. From Earth orbit, 400 km above our planet, the crew present the very first Space Olympics. ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet shared this video on social media with the caption: “The first ever Space Olympics ! A Saturday afternoon on the International Space Station. Four disciplines. Rules that evolved as we played. Seven athletes. Four nations. Two teams. Crew cohesion and morale boosted like never before. The first Space Olympics saw Team Crew Dragon and Team Soyuz compete in lack-of-floor-routine, no-handball, sync…
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With the first Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite in orbit since 2015 and the second since 2017, engineers are busy preparing the mission’s follow-on pair to eventually pick up the baton to supply images for a myriad of applications from food security to monitoring the decline of Earth’s ice. Slated for launch at the beginning of 2024, Sentinel-2C has just started a punishing five-month testing programme to ensure that it is fit for its life in space. View the full article
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Week in images: 02 - 06 August 2021 Discover our week through the lens View the full article
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Image: Crater trio View the full article
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Forests are not only key to moderating our climate by sequestering atmospheric carbon, but they also create a cooling effect by increasing low-level cloud. A first global assessment using satellite observations has shown that for two-thirds of the world, afforestation increases low-level cloud cover, with the effect being strongest over evergreen needleleaf forest. View the full article
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Russia has the largest area of forest on the planet, with more than a fifth of the world's trees. A new study, led by Russian scientists using data from ESA’s Climate Change Initiative, has produced new estimates of biomass contained in Russian forests, and confirms that the vast forested area is storing more carbon than previously estimated. View the full article
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Image: This map generated using data from Copernicus Sentinel-3 shows the temperature of the land surface on 2 August 2021. View the full article
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Image: Captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-3 mission on 30 July 2021, this image shows smoke billowing from several fires along the southern coast of Turkey. View the full article
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Solar Orbiter and BepiColombo are set to make space history with two Venus flybys just 33 hours apart on 9 and 10 August. View the full article
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The first science tests for the ExoMars rover replica kicked off after several weeks of driving tests around the Mars Terrain Simulator at the ALTEC premises in Turin, Italy. View the full article
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“I am finding it magical every day, but there is also a lot of routine,” says ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet reflecting on his first 100 days aboard the International Space Station during his second mission. In total, Thomas has logged 296 days in space. View the full article
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A sophisticated telecommunications satellite that can be completely repurposed while in space has launched. View the full article
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Europe’s Ariane 5 has delivered two telecom satellites Star One D2 and Eutelsat Quantum into their planned transfer orbits. View the full article
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Video: 00:00:49 The first flight of Ariane 5 in 2021 delivers two satellites including the ESA-backed telecommunications satellite Eutelsat Quantum into space. View the full article
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Week in images: 26 - 30 July 2021 Discover our week through the lens View the full article
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The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over Malé – the capital and most populous city in the Republic of Maldives. View the full article
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Video: 00:04:00 ESA's Jupiter Icy moons Explorer, Juice, has successfully completed rigorous thermal tests simulating the extreme coldness of space and the warmth of the Sun at ESA’s test centre ESTEC, in The Netherlands. The spacecraft underwent a month of round-the-clock testing and monitoring in the Large Space Simulator, which recreates the vacuum of space and is able to simulate both hot and cold space environments. The spacecraft was subjected to temperatures ranging from 250 degrees to minus 180 degrees Celsius, showing that it can survive its journey in space. Juice will launch in 2022 to our Solar System’s largest planet. It will spend over four years stu…
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Image: Jupiter mission passes space vacuum test View the full article
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Image: For the first time, astronomers have seen light coming from behind a black hole. Using ESA’s XMM-Newton and NASA’s NuSTAR space telescopes, an international team of scientists led by Dan Wilkins of Stanford University in the USA observed extremely bright flares of X-ray light coming from around a black hole. The X-ray flares echoed off of the gas falling into the black hole, and as the flares were subsiding, the telescopes picked up fainter flashes, which were the echoes of the flares bouncing off the gas behind the black hole. This supermassive black hole is 10 million times as massive as our Sun and located in the centre of a nearby spiral galaxy called I Zwic…
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Future rockets could fly with tanks made of lightweight carbon fibre reinforced plastic thanks to ground-breaking research carried out within ESA’s Future Launchers Preparatory Programme. View the full article
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Follow the launch on 30 July of a sophisticated telecommunications satellite capable of being completely repurposed while in space. View the full article
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ESA has successfully operated a spacecraft with Europe’s next-generation mission control system for the first time. The powerful software, named the 'European Ground System - Common Core' (EGS-CC), will be the ‘brain’ of all European spaceflight operations in the years to come, and promises new possibilities for how future missions will fly. View the full article
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A European telecommunications satellite that can be completely repurposed while in orbit has been placed on board a rocket ready for launch on 30 July. View the full article
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