VULCAiN Ai

Oct 24, 2024

The first launch of Ariane 6, the new European rocket, was a success 26 Ariane 6 flies, finally. The new European Space Agency ( ESA ) rocket has reached orbit and put an end to what was now sadly known as the “launcher crisis”, to regain autonomy in access to space. It took off at 9pm Italian time from the launch pad of the Kourou spaceport, brushing a long trail across the equatorial sky of French Guiana, for its inaugural launch. “A big thank you to the people who worked on all this – exulted the director of ESA, Josef Aschbacher – today we are making history. It is a beautiful moment, thanks to the industries, ArianeGroup (which developed and built the rocket ed. ), Arianespace, to the Cnes (the French Space Agency), everyone did their best, this is a historic moment for Europe” . But there was a problem in the final part of the flight, two hours and 40 minutes after take-off. It was a problem with the auxiliary propulsion unit, which keeps the tank’s propellant under pressure and assists the second stage engine. An anomaly in this system prevented the Vinci from performing the final maneuver of controlled re-entry into the atmosphere to avoid being abandoned in space like garbage. The stadium will therefore remain in low orbit for an indefinite period, probably a few years. An ESA task force is working to understand the causes of the problem, Director General Aschbacher said. However, this does not affect the plans, at least at the moment: a new flight of Ariane 6 is expected by the end of the year, immediately after the last takeoff of Vega and the return to operation of Vega C , he specified. The team will have the task of establishing whether failure to restart the engine could jeopardize future missions. A “heavy” carrier Ah two configurations: Ariane 62 (the one chosen for the debut) and Ariane 64, depending on how many side boosters, two or four, are applied. It consists of two stages. The first has a Vulcain 2.1 engine powered by hydrogen and oxygen, an evolution of Ariane 5’s Vulcain 2. To leave the ground, however, most of the energy will be provided by the P120c boosters, built by Avio in Colleferro, near in Rome, which burn solid fuel instead. After 7 minutes and 41 seconds the Vulcain shuts down and separation occurs: from here onwards the Vinci continues the push. The engine developed for Ariane 6 can be reignited up to four times to deliver multiple satellites to different orbits, thus gaining flexibility to meet the needs of customers who intend to launch satellites into different orbital planes. The last flare is destined to re-enter the atmosphere, so as not to leave debris. Customers, delays and cancellations As the successor to Ariane 5, whose reliability has been a pride of ArianeGroup for 35 years, Ariane 6 immediately enjoyed great trust “sight unseen”. In fact, even before taking flight, it already has an order book of around thirty launches booked. Many for institutional clients, but 18 of these will be for a single client: Amazon has in fact chosen Ariane 6 for the delivery into orbit of approximately 700 satellites of the Kuiper broadband satellite internet mega constellation. There are 18 launches in total. An important customer to whom we can finally give answers, considering the delays of a vehicle approved in 2014 and which was supposed to be launched in 2020. In four years technical and development difficultiesand a pandemic in the middle, have complicated everything, for a project which has the task of being reliable, certainly not cutting-edge. That is destined for future adventures, with the development of engines and rocket stages capable of returning to earth to be reused (they are called Themis and Prometheus), for which SpaceX, however, is well over a decade ahead. Or to a startup daughter of ArianeGroup, totally made in France: MaiaSpace. In the meantime, there are those who have canceled the contract. This is not just any customer, but EumetSat, the intergovernmental organization that manages Europe’s weather satellites. Just about ten days before the inaugural flight, it announced that it had “moved” the launch of its satellite (scheduled for 2025) from Ariane 6 to SpaceX. A “French” pitcher Ariane 6 is officially a European launcher, financed by ESA and developed and built by ArianeGroup, a French company (Airbus and Safran) at its sites in France and Germany. These two countries participate most massively in the expenses: 55.6% and 20% respectively. An important role is played byItaly with 7.7%which translates into supply of side boosters P120c which ignite at take-off, and elements of the second stage oxygen turbopump. A total of 13 ESA member states contribute to it. It is a strategic program both for the Space Agency and for individual states across the continent: the launch service will serve to bring important and in certain cases strategic assets (military and civil technology) into orbit for territorial governance and defense . And it has to stay on the market, not exactly an easy feat. [[ge:rep-locali:content-hub:357785935]] Ariane 6 delays and inflation have taken a toll repercussions on development costs, which are now approaching 4 billion euros. And others will be added in the future. The three main states that support it have in fact requested up to 340 million per year to “operate” the rocket. In practice, to reduce the costs at which launches are sold on the market, together with an industry effort to reduce prices. Public aid to keep up with SpaceX (there is also 21 million for Vega C, the light rocket with an Italian heart). It should not be forgotten, however, that Elon Musk’s company also enjoys great advantages because it sells launches at home (to NASA and Defense) at much higher prices and can afford to be competitive on the market, an operation that insiders, especially Europeans, they bluntly call price dumping. But these additional 340 million made many people turn up their noses, for two reasons: the first is that supporting the Ariane 6 project, which with almost equal power has the ambition of being 40% less expensive, was the promise that it would sustain itself on the market without further subsidies. Furthermore, this is a historical moment in which other paths must be sought. In fact, ESA has announced a European competition for startups that develop space rockets. The idea is to liberalize a sector that on our continent has for decades been the prerogative of one or two players: ArianeGroup and Avio. And this is also seen as a cause of the launcher crisis of the last two years (Vega C is on the ground after having failed the second launch, losing two French Pleiades satellites, it should fly again by the end of 2024). [[ge:rep-locali:content-hub:350056538]] In the future, ESA will do like NASA with SpaceX, it will benefit from a launch service to be acquired on the market from the highest bidder. As long as it’s European. Space companies strongly ask that Europe, especially the institutional one, buy space technologies and services from their companies, a sort of protectionism, like what the Americans practice. The hope is that competition will make its benefits felt in the coming years. It’s going to take a while, in the meantime, it’s time for Ariane 6. #launch #Ariane #European #rocket #success –