The powerful new Arian 6 rocket from Europe can fly for the second time today (3rd March) and watch the action live.
Starting today, Ariane 6 will launch a French spy satellite from Kourou’s European Space Pillar at the French Guiana, EST (1624 GMT, 1:24 pm local time in Kourou).
You can watch this action live on Space.com. Direct It is via Arianespace, a French-based company. Coverage begins approximately 30 minutes before lift-off.
Ariane 6, run by ArianeSpace on behalf of the European Space Agency (ESA), is the main successor Arian 5retired in 2023 after 117 orbital missions.
It took longer than expected for the new rocket to come online. Development of the Ariane 6 began in 2014, but the launcher didn’t debut until last July when it sent nine Cubesats onto the track. However, the flight was not fully conducted. The upper stage of the Ariane 6 failed to complete the engine burn, which was designed to set up the deployment of two experimental reentry capsules.
The ESA was aiming to launch the second mission of the Ariane 6 last year, but spent the extra time dealing with the issues experienced on Flight 1.
Related: New European Arian 6 rockets on the long-awaited debut mission (video)
Today’s launch will send a light spy satellite called the French Army CSO-3. Once everything goes into planning, CSO-3 will unfold in a solar-synchronous orbit around 500 miles (800 km) of Earth.
Satellite Sun – Synchronous Orbit Cruise planet patches every day with the same local solar time. This means looking at areas with consistent lighting conditions over time. Therefore, this type of orbit is particularly popular with spies and weather satellites.
“CSO-3 is the third of the constellations of three military Earth observation satellites in the DGA-led Musis program (multinarian space-based imaging system). statement. (DGA, or directional Généralede L’Armement, is the defence procurement agency of the French government.)
The network’s first two members, CSO-1 and CSO-2, were released in 2018 and 2020, respectively.
