Biomass is an European Space Agency mission designed to measure the density of carbon stored in the world's forests. The spacecraft, built by Airbus Defence and Space, features the first civilian P-band synthetic aperture radar as well as a 12m-diameter deployable reflector from L3Harris made of over 900 km of gold-coated molybdenum 25µm wire. With a minimum operational lifetime of 5 years in its 666km 6am/6pm sun-synchronous orbit, the global coverage achieved every 9 months allows to precisely monitor the evolution of forests over time.
Vega-C is a single-body rocket nearly 35 m high with that weighs 210 tonnes on the launch pad. As with Vega, its main elements are three solid-propellant stages, an upper stage powered by a reignitable liquid-propellant engine and a payload fairing. Vega-C's P120C first stage replaces Vega’s smaller P80 to provide a significant increase in thrust at liftoff. It is also used as boosters (2 or 4) for the Ariane 6 rocket.
See DetailsAvio S.p.A. is an Italian company operating in the aerospace sector with its head office in Colleferro near Rome, Italy. Founded in 1908, it is present in Italy and abroad with different commercial offices and 10 production sites.
INFO WIKIMarking another step towards new insights into Earth’s forests and their role in the carbon cycle, ESA’s groundbreaking Biomass satellite has arrived at Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana, to be prepared for liftoff on a Vega-C rocket at …
There's a valuable payload riding on the final Vega rocket launch.
Two of the four tanks necessary to power the fourth stage of the final Vega flight disappeared several months ago, leaving Avio scrambling to find an alternate solution. The Vega AVUM fourth stage stands at 1.74 meters tall with a diameter…
Chinese classified satellite claimed to be for communication technology test purposes. Actual mission not known.
Eighth test flight of the two-stage Starship launch vehicle.
The CSO-3 (Composante Spatiale Optique-3 satellite is the third of three new-generation high-resolution optical imaging satellites for the French mil…
A batch of 21 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.
Glonass-K2 are the fourth generation of satellite design for GLONASS satellite navigation system. GLONASS is a Russian space-based navigation system …
Details TBD.
Progress resupply mission to the International Space Station.
Commercial Earth observation satellites (~540 kg each) built by CAST for China Siwei Survey and Mapping Technology Co. Ltd., with resolution down to …
A batch of 21 satellites for the Starlink mega-constellation - SpaceX's project for space-based Internet communication system.
This is the second mission of Nova-C lunar lander developed and built by Intuitive Machines. This time it carries a NASA payload called PRIME-1 (Pola…