Rounding off November with an impressive haul, European launch provider Arianespace has announced seven orders for its launch vehicles. The first five came from the European Commission in support of the European Copernicus earth observation programme. The remaining two were of a commercial nature; two GEO satellites for long-term customer Intelsat.
An Artist’s impression of the Vega-C rocket. Courtesy of ESA
Vega-C
On 29 November the Commission selected the Italian-built Vega-C rocket to launch five satellites between 2024-2026. The satellites covered are: Sentinel-1D (H2 2024), Sentinel-2C (mid-2024), Sentinel-3C (2024/25), and CO2M A/B (2025 & 2026 respectively). The relatively new Vega-C rocket has arrived on the scene just in time for Arianespace as its predecessor – the Vega – would not have been able to lift all of these spacecraft. The Russian Soyuz 2 rocket may have been a contender for some of these missions but relations between Europe and Russia have deteriorated significantly since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, rendering these rockets inaccessible.
Arianespace CEO, Stephane Israel, declined to reveal figures but did comment to say the value of the new contracts was “highly competitive” with previous launches of such satellites from the USA.
Ariane 6
Arianespace announced that it had received a dual satellite launch contract from GEO operator Intelsat the following day, on 30 November. This mission will utilise an Ariane 64 rocket to launch the Intelsat 41 and Intelsat 44 satellites in 2025.
The order is a modification to a pre-existing launch booking Intelsat has had with Arianespace for an Ariane 6 mission dating from 2020.
