29.01.2025
Arianespace to Launch Second Ariane 6 Rocket on 26 February
Credit: ESA / CNES / Arianespace / ArianeGroup
Arianespace has announced that the second flight of the Ariane 6 rocket will take place on 26 February at 5:24 PM CET (1:24 PM local time) from the Guiana Space Centre. The flight will be the rocket’s first commercial flight and will launch the CSO-3 spy satellite for the French Armed Forces.
“With this launch in support of French defence and the capability requirements of several partner nations, Arianespace will guarantee independent access to space for France and Europe, for the benefit of all our fellow citizens,” said Arianespace’s new CEO, David Cavaillolès.
Ariane 6 was successfully launched for the first time on 9 July 2024. Initially, the rocket’s second flight had been expected to take place before the end of 2024. However, in November, Arianespace, the rocket’s commercial operator, announced the flight had been delayed to no earlier than February 2025 to give ArianeGroup time to work through a few post-debut fixes.
On 13 and 14 January, the Ariane 6 core stage stack and two solid-fuel boosters were successfully brought together on the ELA-4 launch pad. While this process was occurring, an Antonov transport plane touched down at Felix Eboué Airport carrying the rocket’s payload, the CSO-3 reconnaissance satellite.
The 3,500-kilogram CSO-3 satellite is the third addition to France’s MUSIS (Multinational Space-based Imaging System) programme. This three-satellite constellation is designed to support defence and security reconnaissance, providing high-resolution imagery for military operations and national security purposes.
After a successful launch, the CSO-3 satellite will be deployed into a sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) at an altitude of around 800 kilometres. The payload deployment will occur 1 hour and 6 minutes after liftoff.
A total of five Ariane 6 launches are planned for 2025, including the debut of the Ariane 64, the four-booster variant of the rocket. The first Ariane 64 flight will carry Project Kuiper satellites for Amazon, marking the beginning of Arianespace’s 18-launch commitment to the tech giant.
Quelle: European Spaceflight
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Update: 13.02.2025
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Arianespace plans five Ariane 6 launches in 2025, primarily in the second half of the year
An Ariane 6 is prepared for the launch of the CSO-3 reconnaissance satellite on Feb. 26. Credit: Arianespace
WASHINGTON — As Arianespace prepares for its first commercial Ariane 6 launch, the company is projecting a manifest for the vehicle backloaded to the second half of the year.
Arianespace is working towards a Feb. 26 launch of an Ariane 6 carrying the CSO-3 reconnaissance satellite for the French military. The launch, from the European spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, will be the first for the rocket since its inaugural flight last July.
Arianespace considers this mission, designed VA263, the first commercial flight of the Ariane 6 since the company, rather than ESA, will be overseeing it. “This marks the start of the Ariane 6 operating phase, and it’s an honor to open this new era for Arianespace,” David Cavaillolès, chief executive of Arianespace, said in a statement.
The launch will also be the first for Cavaillolès since joining the company in January as chief executive. He succeeded Stéphane Israël, who had been chief executive since 2013 but left to become a partner at Boston Consulting Group.
Cavaillolès made his debut as chief executive of Arianespace on the conference circuit during a panel at the European Space Conference Jan. 28. “We have a very steep ramp-up plan,” he said of the Ariane 6 flight rate. “This year we target to achieve five flights of Ariane 6, the first one being in February, and then we want to reach our target cadence as soon as possible. By target cadence, I mean between 9 and 10 launches per year.”
That long-term target remains unchanged from past comments by Arianespace officials, although at the World Space Business Week conference in September, the company was projecting six Ariane 6 launches in 2025. That was before the second launch, originally planned for late 2024, slipped into 2025.
However, there will be a long pause after the Ariane 6 launch of CSO-3. At the conference, Arianespace announced an agreement with Eumetsat to launch the Metop-SG-A1 polar-orbiting weather satellite on the second commercial Ariane 6 mission, VA264, in August. That satellite was already set to fly on Ariane 6 but Arianespace said it was moving the satellite up to the VA264 launch.
Arianespace has not disclosed a schedule for the remaining Ariane 6 launches it plans for the final four months of 2025, but said one will carry the Sentinel-1D radar imaging satellite for the ESA/European Commission Copernicus program of Earth observation satellites. Arianespace said it signed an agreement with ESA for that launch at the same time it moved up the Eumetsat launch.
Cavaillolès, at the conference, did not state when Arianespace would reach that target of 9–10 Ariane 6 launches a year, but noted the company needed to do so quickly to serve a backlog of commercial launches, one dominated by Amazon’s Project Kuiper constellation, which acquired 18 Ariane 6 launches in 2022.
“My focus in the short term is to deliver the ramp-up, to deliver the Kuiper contract with Amazon and, of course, to deliver the institutional contract with the European Commission and ESA,” he said.
Cavaillolès added at the conference that he is thinking ahead to plans for the IRIS² secure connectivity constellation by the European Union, which is projected to require 13 Ariane 64 launches in 2029 and 2030.
“IRIS² will be one big topic this year,” he said. “This year, my priority will be to discuss with our industrial and institutional partners to make IRIS² a reality. I feel a real will to make it happen. Now, the devil is in the details.”
Quelle: SN
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Update: 21.02.2025
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Quelle: arianespace
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Update: 3.03.2025
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Europe's new Ariane 6 heavy-lift rocket launching for 2nd time ever today: Watch live
Liftoff was scheduled for 11:24 a.m. ET today (March 3).
Europe's powerful new Ariane 6 rocket will fly for the second time ever today (March 3), and you can watch the action live.
The Ariane 6 is scheduled to launch a French spy satellite from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana today at 11:24 a.m. EST (1624 GMT; 1:24 p.m. local time in Kourou).
You can watch the action live here at Space.com or directly via the France-based company Arianespace. Coverage will begin about 30 minutes before liftoff.
Ariane 6, which Arianespace operates on behalf of the European Space Agency(ESA), is the successor to the workhorse Ariane 5, which retired 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 successfully sent nine cubesats to orbit. The flight didn't go perfectly, however; the Ariane 6's upper stage failed to complete an engine burn designed to set up the deployment of two experimental reentry capsules.
ESA had aimed to launch the Ariane 6's second mission last year but took some extra time to address the issues experienced on Flight 1.
Today's launch will send up an optical spy satellite called CSO-3 for the French military. If all goes to plan, CSO-3 will deploy into a sun-synchronous orbit about 500 miles (800 kilometers) above Earth.
Satellites in sun-synchronous orbit cruise over patches of the planet at the same local solar time each day, meaning they view those areas with consistent lighting conditions over time. This type of orbit is therefore particularly popular with spy and weather satellites.
"CSO-3 is the third in a constellation of three military Earth-observation satellites for the DGA-led MUSIS program (Multinational Space-based Imaging System)," the French space agency CNES said in a statement. (The DGA, or Direction générale de l'armement, is the French government's defense procurement agency.)
The first two members of the network, CSO-1 and CSO-2, launched in 2018 and 2020, respectively.
Quelle: SC
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Quelle: arianespace
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Update: 5.03.2025
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FLIGHT VA263 NOW SCHEDULED ON MARCH 6, 2025
The investigations carried out on the ground means interfacing with the launcher, following the launch attempt on March 3, now enable Arianespace to target a launch on March 6, 2025, at 1:24 p.m. local time in Kourou, French Guiana (4:24 p.m. UTC, 5:24 p.m. CET).
Ariane 6 and its passenger, the CSO-3 satellite, are in stable and safe conditions.
Quelle: arianespace
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Update: 7.03.2025
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Ariane 6 launches French spysat on second flight
Ariane 6 lifts off on its second flight March 6. Credit: ESA-CNES-ARIANESPACE-ArianeGroup/Optique vidéo du CSG - P PIRON
WASHINGTON — An Ariane 6 launched a reconnaissance satellite for the French military March 6 on the second flight of the European rocket.
The Ariane 6 lifted off from the European spaceport at Kourou, French Guiana, at 11:24 a.m. Eastern on a mission designated VA263. The rocket quickly soared out of view into cloudy skies above the spaceport. Payload deployment took place a little more than an hour after liftoff following a second burn of the upper stage.
The payload was CSO-3, the third and final in a series of reconnaissance satellites known as Composante Spatiale Optique for the French military. CSO-3, like its two predecessors, will provide high-resolution imagery for France for European allies. Airbus Defence and Space built the satellite bus and Thales Alenia Space provided the imaging payload.
The launch was just the second flight of the Ariane 6, after a mostly successful debut in July 2024. The rocket reached orbit and deployed its satellite payloads, but failed to perform a final deorbit burn, stranding the upper stage and two reentry vehicles still attached to it in orbit.
At the time of that launch, Arianespace had planned to conduct the second Ariane 6 before the end of the year after diagnosing the issue that prevented the upper stage from deorbiting. In November, though, the company delayed the launch to February, citing only ongoing work to address “a small number of deviations” seen in data from the flight.
Arianespace then targeted a launch Feb. 26, but postponed that launch to fix unspecified issues with ground systems needed for the launch. A launch attempt March 3 was scrubbed less than an hour before liftoff, again because of ground infrasrtrucutre issues.
The CSO-3 launch was the first of five launches Arianespace is planning for the Ariane 6 in 2025, David Cavaillolès, the new chief executive of Arianespace, said at the European Space conference Jan. 28. He said the company would work to achieve its goal of 9 to 10 Ariane 6 launches a year “as soon as possible.”
The 2025 schedule, though, is backloaded to the second half of the year. The next Ariane 6 launch may not take place until August. Arianespace announced at the European Space Conference an agreement with Eumetsat, the European weather satellite operator, to move up the launch of Metop-SG-A1 polar-orbiting satellite to the second commercial Ariane 6 launch, VA264, which it said would take place in August.
Arianespace has not disclosed a schedule for the remaining Ariane 6 launches it plans for the final four months of 2025, but one will carry the Sentinel-1D radar imaging satellite for the ESA/European Commission Copernicus program of Earth observation satellites, according to an agreement also announced in January.
Getting to that target launch cadence is vital for Arianespace to serve its largest commercial customer, Amazon’s Project Kuiper broadband constellation. Amazon acquired 18 Ariane 6 launches in 2022 as part of launch deals that also included contracts with Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance.
“My focus in the short term is to deliver the ramp-up, to deliver the Kuiper contract with Amazon and, of course, to deliver the institutional contract with the European Commission and ESA,” Cavaillolès said at the conference.
Quelle: SN
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Ariane 6 takes flight for the second time
Europe’s newest rocket, Ariane 6, took flight for the second time from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana at 13:24 local time on 6 March (16:24 GMT, 17:24 CET). This was the first commercial flight for Ariane 6, flight VA263, delivering the CSO-3 satellite to orbit. Arianespace was the operator and launch service provider for the French Procurement agency (DGA) and France’s space agency CNES on behalf of the French Air and Space Force’s Space Command (CDE).
During this second launch, all phases were successfully executed, including the Auxiliary Propulsion Unit (APU) reignition, the Vinci engine’s third boost and deorbiting of the upper stage.
Josef Aschbacher, ESA’s Director General said: “The second successful flight of Ariane 6 marks a significant milestone in Europe's journey towards enhanced autonomous access to space. Ariane 6 is a bedrock of this endeavour, paving the way for a promising future for European space activities, alongside Vega-C and new European launchers on the horizon. This achievement would not have been possible without the dedication, collaboration, and hard work of our incredible teams. My heartfelt thanks go out to all colleagues who have made this monumental accomplishment possible. Together, we are elevating the future of Europe - and remember, it all starts with a launch.”
“The first commercial launch of Ariane 6 demonstrates what will become regular with several Ariane 6 launches planned for 2025. The upper stage also showed its full potential, a unique piece of hardware that can ensure all types of missions to orbit while also actively avoid becoming space debris itself, reaffirming Europe’s commitment to minimise in-orbit space debris,” said Toni Tolker-Nielsen, ESA Director of Space Transportation.
Ariane 6 is Europe’s heavy launcher and a key element of ESA’s efforts to ensure autonomous access to space for Europe’s citizens. Its modular and versatile design allows it to launch all missions from low-Earth orbit into deep space. For this launch, the rocket was used in its two-booster configuration.
Shortly after liftoff and booster separation, the upper stage separated from the core stage. The upper stage engine then fired for the first time, taking Ariane 6 into an elliptical orbit travelling 300 km at its closest to Earth, and 600 km at its farthest from Earth, achieving the ‘chill-down’ and first ignition of the Vinci engine and of the Auxiliary Propulsion Unit. After a ‘coasting’ phase lasting 37 minutes, the engine fired up for a second time.
After Vinci’s second boost, the rocket’s passenger, a French satellite called CSO-3, was injected into Sun-Synchronous Orbit at an altitude of around 800 km. Spacecraft separation occurred one hour and six minutes after liftoff.
After the successful delivery of CSO-3, Ariane 6 demonstrated the full potential of its upper stage. The Auxiliary Propulsion Unit ignited as expected, and the Vinci engine’s third boost put the upper stage into a reentry orbit to safely burn up through Earth’s atmosphere, preventing accumulation of space debris. This confirms the full capability of Ariane 6.
Quelle: ESA