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Russian rocket successfully orbits European space telescope and four satellites

The space telescope is intended to operate for 3.5 years

Mission control center at the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana Sergei Savostyanov/TASS

Mission control center at the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana

© Sergei Savostyanov/TASS

PARIS, December 18. /TASS/. Russia’s Soyuz-ST-A carrier rocket launched from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana has successfully orbited five European space vehicles, including the CHEOPS telescope intended to study exoplanets. The flight operator Arianespace held a live broadcast of the space mission on its website on Wednesday.

The Russian carrier rocket blasted off at 11:54 a.m. Moscow time. About 10 minutes after the liftoff, the Fregat-MT booster separated from the Russian launch vehicle in the normal mode. Thirteen minutes after that, the Italian Space Agency’s COSMO-SkyMed CSG-1 satellite was the first to separate from the Russian booster. The satellite with a launch weight of 2.2 tonnes was made on order from the Italian government and is intended for the Earth’s radar observation for both military and scientific purposes in any weather conditions. It will assume its position in the sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of about 620 km and operate for seven years.

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Russia’s Soyuz rocket with telescope to study exoplanets blasts off from Kourou spaceport

Two hours and 25 minutes after that, Europe’s CHEOPS (CHaracterising ExOPlanets Satellite) space telescope developed under the program of the fundamental space research by the European Space Agency (ESA) in partnership with the Swiss Space Office (SSO) separated from the Russian rocket’s upper stage. The telescope with a launch weight of 273 kg will assume its position in the sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of about 700 km. The space telescope is intended to operate for 3.5 years.

CHEOPS has a 32 cm mirror as its main instrument. It is designed to study conditions on the already known exoplanets rotating around the stars closest to the solar system and to search for new such planets through the transit method. In the first place, the surveys will study planets with the masses ranging from the mass of Venus to the mass of Neptune and help select planetary candidates for closer observation with the help of the European E-ELT super-telescope and the US James Webb orbital observatory that are being prepared for their launch.

The other three small-size satellites separated slightly more than four hours and 10 minutes after the liftoff and will assume their positions in the sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 500 km.

The ESA’s OPS-SAT is intended to study new technologies in satellite control. The EeySat developed under the program of the French Space Agency (CNES) for students’ projects is primarily designated to study zodiacal light. The ANGELS is the first French nanosatellite intended to receive and transmit information from over 20,000 Argos beacons.

Launch problems

The blastoff was initially scheduled for December 17, the same hours, but was delayed for a day due to an error found in the rocket’s systems during pre-launch tests. Arianespace did not disclose the cause of this incident.

This mission has been the 23rd Soyuz rocket launch from the Kourou spaceport and the concluding event for Arianespace in 2019. Overall, Arianespace conducted the launches of eight rockets in the outgoing year: four Ariane 5 heavy-class rockets, two Soyuz medium-class launch vehicles and two light Vega carriers. In 2018, three Soyuz rockets blasted off from the Kourou spaceport.

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