SpaceWatch.Global reports, “The Ariane 6 Launcher Task Force has announced that Ariane 6’s first launch attempt will happen within the first two weeks of July 2024, on track with the launch period it communicated in November. Furthermore, the task force will give the tentative date for the first launch attempt at the ILA airshow in Berlin, Germany, which will hold from 5 June to 9 June, where all the task force members will be present.”
Full Story (SpaceWatch.Global)
Tag: scheduled
First Launch of Ariane 6 Set for July 9
Aviation Week reports, “After last year’s announcement of the June 15-30 window for the first flight of the Ariane 6 rocket, the European Space Agency has set a launch date of July 9 for the delayed program. European Space Agency (ESA) Director General Josef Aschbacher made the announcement June 5 at the ILA Berlin air…”
Full Story (Aviation Week – Subscription Publication)
CST-100 Starliner Arrives at Pad for Crewed Test Flight
Space News reports, “Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner is now installed on the Atlas 5 rocket that will launch the spacecraft on a crewed test flight to the International Space Station next month. The spacecraft rolled out from Boeing’s Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility at the Kennedy Space Center to Space Launch Complex 41 in the early morning hours April 16.”
Full Story (Space News)
Ariane 5 Launch Scheduled for July 4
Spaceflight Now reports that Europe’s last Ariane 5 rocket “is now scheduled to lift off July 4 after being grounded for more than two weeks due to a problem with the pyrotechnic systems required to jettison the launcher’s strap-on solid rocket boosters.” Europe’s workhorse rocket “is being retired after 27 years of service.” The Ariane 5 was originally “scheduled to fly on June 16, but officials from Arianespace, the rocket’s commercial operator, announced on the eve of launch that they were delaying the mission to replace pyrotechnic transmission lines on the vehicle.” The suspect systems “identified fire explosive charges that jettison one of the two solid rocket boosters two minutes into flight, then to activate the ‘distancing’ system, which uses small thrusters on the boosters to ensure the spent casings safely fly clear of the Ariane 5’s core stage as it continues its climb to orbit.”
Full Story (Spaceflight Now)
SpaceX to Launch Euclid Dark Energy Probe
SPACE reported that Euclid, a dark matter and dark energy hunter, is “scheduled to launch atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on July 1 at 11:11 a.m. EDT (1511 GMT).” Euclid aims to “map the extent and influence of the dark universe to a sharper degree than ever before, with numerous implications: how the universe grew in its early days, how galaxies come together, and why the expansion of the universe is accelerating.” Euclid Project Scientist René Laureijs said, “Dark energy and dark matter reveal themselves by the fairly subtle changes they make to the appearance of objects in the visible universe; otherwise we don’t know about them.”
Full Story (SPACE)
Musk Says SpaceX Plans to Launch Starship Again in Six to Eight Weeks
SPACE reports that Elon Musk announced Tuesday on Twitter that the SpaceX is shooting for another liftoff of Starship six to eight weeks from now. That timeline “may be ambitious, however, given the amount of prep work required ahead of the second flight.” For example, the liftoff “damaged Starbase’s orbital launch mount, blasting out a big crater beneath it and sending chunks of concrete flying, along with a huge cloud of dust and other debris.” SpaceX has been “developing and testing a water-cooled steel plate that will sit beneath the mount and prevent a recurrence of this problem, Musk said recently.” The company could also face some regulatory hurdles in a “coalition of environmental groups [that] is currently suing the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the body that issued Starship’s launch license, saying the agency didn’t properly assess the potential damage that the giant vehicle could inflict on the South Texas ecosystem and the human communities around Starbase.”
Full Story (SPACE)
NASA, Boeing Still Working Towards July Starliner Launch
Space News reported that NASA and The Boeing Company say they are “still working towards a July launch of the CST-100 Starliner on a crewed test flight despite ‘emerging issues’ and concerns raised by a safety panel.” The two organizations say they have completed a “checkpoint review” for preparations for the Crew Flight Test missions, which is scheduled for no earlier than July 21. Two NASA astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, “will fly on CFT to the International Space Station on the short test flight, the first crewed flight of the spacecraft.”
Full Story (Space News)