The Latest Discovery by a Mars Lander That Permanently Fell Silent Years Ago...

NASA / JPL - Caltech

NASA Marsquake Data Reveals Lumpy Nature of Red Planet’s Interior (News Release)

Rocky material that impacted Mars lies scattered in giant lumps throughout the planet’s mantle, offering clues about Mars’ interior and its ancient past.

What appear to be fragments from the aftermath of massive impacts on Mars that occurred 4.5 billion years ago have been detected deep below the planet’s surface. The discovery was made thanks to NASA’s now-retired InSight lander, which recorded the findings before the mission’s end in 2022. The ancient impacts released enough energy to melt continent-size swaths of the early crust and mantle into vast magma oceans, simultaneously injecting the impactor fragments and Martian debris deep into the planet’s interior.

There’s no way to tell exactly what struck Mars: The early Solar System was filled with a range of different rocky objects that could have done so, including some so large they were effectively protoplanets. The remains of these impacts still exist in the form of lumps that are as large as 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) across and scattered throughout the Martian mantle. They offer a record preserved only on worlds like Mars, whose lack of tectonic plates has kept its interior from being churned up the way Earth’s is through a process known as convection.

The finding was reported on Thursday, August 28, in a study published by the journal Science.

“We’ve never seen the inside of a planet in such fine detail and clarity before,” said the paper’s lead author, Constantinos Charalambous of Imperial College London. “What we’re seeing is a mantle studded with ancient fragments. Their survival to this day tells us Mars’ mantle has evolved sluggishly over billions of years. On Earth, features like these may well have been largely erased.”

InSight, which was managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, placed the first seismometer on Mars’ surface in 2018. The extremely-sensitive instrument recorded 1,319 marsquakes before the lander’s end of mission in 2022.

Quakes produce seismic waves that change as they pass through different kinds of material, providing scientists a way to study the interior of a planetary body. To date, the InSight team has measured the size, depth and composition of Mars’ crust, mantle and core. This latest discovery regarding the mantle’s composition suggests how much is still waiting to be discovered within InSight’s data.

“We knew Mars was a time capsule bearing records of its early formation, but we didn’t anticipate just how clearly we’d be able to see with InSight,” said Tom Pike of Imperial College London, coauthor of the paper.

Quake hunting

Mars lacks the tectonic plates that produce the temblors many people in seismically-active areas are familiar with. But there are two other types of quakes on Earth that also occur on Mars: those caused by rocks cracking under heat and pressure, and those caused by meteoroid impacts.

Of the two types, meteoroid impacts on Mars produce high-frequency seismic waves that travel from the crust deep into the planet’s mantle, according to a paper published earlier this year in Geophysical Research Letters. Located beneath the planet’s crust, the Martian mantle can be as much as 960 miles (1,550 kilometers) thick and is made of solid rock that can reach temperatures as high as 2,732° Fahrenheit (1,500° Celsius).

Scrambled signals

The new Science paper identifies eight marsquakes whose seismic waves contained strong, high-frequency energy that reached deep into the mantle, where their seismic waves were distinctly altered.

“When we first saw this in our quake data, we thought the slowdowns were happening in the Martian crust,” Pike said. “But then we noticed that the farther seismic waves travel through the mantle, the more these high-frequency signals were being delayed.”

Using planetwide computer simulations, the team saw that the slowing down and scrambling happened only when the signals passed through small, localized regions within the mantle. They also determined that these regions appear to be lumps of material with a different composition than the surrounding mantle.

With one riddle solved, the team focused on another: how those lumps got there.

Turning back the clock, they concluded that the lumps likely arrived as giant asteroids or other rocky material that struck Mars during the early Solar System, generating those oceans of magma as they drove deep into the mantle, bringing with them fragments of crust and mantle.

Charalambous likens the pattern to shattered glass — a few large shards with many smaller fragments. The pattern is consistent with a large release of energy that scattered many fragments of material throughout the mantle. It also fits well with current thinking that in the early Solar System, asteroids and other planetary bodies regularly bombarded the young planets.

On Earth, the crust and uppermost mantle is continuously recycled by plate tectonics pushing a plate’s edge into the hot interior, where, through convection, hotter, less-dense material rises and cooler, denser material sinks. Mars, by contrast, lacks tectonic plates, and its interior circulates far more sluggishly. The fact that such fine structures are still visible today, Charalambous said, “tells us Mars hasn’t undergone the vigorous churning that would have smoothed out these lumps.”

And in that way, Mars could point to what may be lurking beneath the surface of other rocky planets that lack plate tectonics, including Venus and Mercury.

Source: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

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NASA / JPL - Caltech

Flying at Light Speed for 192 Months Now...

Sixteen Light-Years... That’s how far the Hello From Earth message has traveled since being transmitted from a giant NASA antenna in Australia to the exoplanet Gliese 581d in the summer of 2009.

As of 7 PM California time tonight (12 PM Sydney time on Thursday, August 28), the radio signal containing 25,878 goodwill text messages—including one by me—will have ventured across approximately 94 trillion miles (151 trillion kilometers) of deep space...which, as stated at the very start of this Blog entry, equals a distance of sixteen light-years.

The signal, despite traveling 186,000 miles per second (or 671 million miles per hour, or um, 1 billion kilometers per hour), will still take about 4 years to reach the Gliese 581 star system. Carry on!

Hubble's Successor Captures Images of 3I/ATLAS...

NASA / James Webb Space Telescope

NASA’s Webb Space Telescope Observes Interstellar Comet (News Release)

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope observed interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS on August 6, with its Near-Infrared Spectrograph instrument. The research team has been analyzing insights from Webb’s data, and a preprint is available online.

Webb is one of NASA’s space telescopes observing this comet, together providing more information about its size, physical properties and chemical makeup. For example, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and the recently-launched SPHEREx mission have also observed the comet.

While the comet poses no threat to Earth, NASA’s space telescopes help support the agency’s ongoing mission to find, track and better understand Solar System objects.

Source: NASA.Gov

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NASA / James Webb Space Telescope


NASA / James Webb Space Telescope

The Orbital Test Vehicle Flies Again...

SpaceX

U.S. Space Force Launches Eighth X-37B Mission (Press Release - August 23)

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. (AFNS) -- The U.S. Space Force, in partnership with SpaceX, successfully launched the eighth mission of the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV-8) on a Falcon 9 rocket at 11:50 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time on August 21, 2025, from Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39A.

The SpaceX rocket carried the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle into orbit, marking the eighth space flight for the X-37B program.

"As we continue to set the pace for space, I am incredibly proud of our team's professionalism and persistence supporting this launch,” said Space Launch Delta 45 Commander Col. Brian Chatman. “X-37B continues to prove itself as a premier testing platform aiding in experiments to better understand our future in space. These experiments, X-37B itself, and Space Launch Delta 45's ability to perform fast, flexible launches all play crucial roles in bolstering our resilience and enhancing our ability to swiftly adapt to the challenges in space of today and tomorrow," Chatman added.

The X-37B is a dynamic and responsive spacecraft responsible for conducting a range of tests and experiments that expedite the development of critical next-generation technologies and operational concepts for reusable space capabilities.

Source: United States Space Force

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SpaceX


SpaceX


U.S. Space Force

An Update on America's Next Interstellar-bound Probe...

NASA / Johns Hopkins APL / Southwest Research Institute / Serge Brunier / Marc Postman / Dan Durda

NASA’s New Horizons Enters Mission’s Longest Hibernation Period (News Release)

Running with updated onboard fault protection software that improves its ability to operate farther from the Sun than originally designed, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has entered the longest hibernation phase of its mission.

At 4:12 a.m. EDT on August 7, flight controllers at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, verified that New Horizons – acting on commands uplinked to its main computer on July 23 – had safely entered hibernation mode again. With the spacecraft now in the outer Kuiper Belt and more than 5.7 billion miles (9.2 billion kilometers) from Earth, the radio signals carrying that confirmation message from New Horizons needed 8 hours and 31 minutes – traveling at the speed of light – to reach the APL Mission Operations Center through NASA’s Goldstone Deep Space Network station in California.

New Horizons, which had been in active data-collection mode since April, will now remain in hibernation. Pending a final Fiscal Year 2026 budget, the spacecraft may be awoken in late June 2026. This will be the longest hibernation period of the mission so far, surpassing the previous mark of 273 days from June 2022 to March 2023.

But the spacecraft won’t be completely at rest; New Horizons will continue to take round-the-clock measurements of the charged-particle environment in the Sun’s outer heliosphere and the dust environment of the Kuiper Belt using three different onboard scientific instruments. These data will be transmitted back to Earth when New Horizons wakes up.

“Even when our spacecraft sleeps, round-the-clock science data collection never stops,” said New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.

What Is Hibernation? Hibernation is a way to extend spacecraft life and reduce mission operations costs. During hibernation, New Horizons remains in a stable spinning mode with much of the spacecraft unpowered. The onboard flight computer monitors system health and broadcasts a weekly beacon-status tone back to Earth through NASA’s Deep Space Network of communications and tracking ground stations.

Since 2007, New Horizons has hibernated 23 times, for periods ranging from just days to many months.

The Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, designed, built and operates the New Horizons spacecraft and manages the mission for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate and the mission’s principal investigator. Southwest Research Institute, based in San Antonio, directs the mission via Principal Investigator Alan Stern, who leads the mission for NASA. NASA Marshall Space Flight Center’s Planetary Management Office in Huntsville, Alabama, provides NASA oversight for New Horizons.

Source: NASA.Gov

One of America's Newest Asteroid Explorers Takes a Snapshot of our Home Planet and its Natural Satellite...

NASA / JPL - Caltech / ASU

NASA’s Psyche Captures Images of Earth, Moon (News Release - August 19)

Headed for a metal-rich asteroid of the same name, the Psyche spacecraft successfully calibrated its cameras by looking homeward.

On schedule for its 2029 arrival at the asteroid Psyche, NASA’s Psyche spacecraft recently looked back toward home and captured images of Earth and our Moon from about 180 million miles (290 million kilometers) away. The images were obtained during one of the mission team’s periodic checkouts of the spacecraft’s science instruments.

On July 20 and July 23, the spacecraft’s twin cameras captured multiple long-exposure (up to 10-second) pictures of the two bodies, which appear as dots sparkling with reflected sunlight amid a starfield in the constellation Aries.

The Psyche multispectral imager instrument comprises a pair of identical cameras equipped with filters and telescopic lenses to photograph the asteroid Psyche’s surface in different wavelengths of light. The color and shape of a planetary body’s spectrum can reveal details about what it’s made of. The Moon and the giant asteroid Vesta, for example, have similar kinds of “bumps and wiggles” in their spectra that scientists could potentially also detect at Psyche.

Members of the mission’s science team are interested in Psyche because it will help them better understand the formation of rocky planets with metallic cores, including Earth.

When choosing targets for the imager testing and calibration, scientists look for bodies that shine with reflected sunlight, just as the asteroid Psyche does. They also look at objects that have a spectrum they’re familiar with, so they can compare previous telescopic or spacecraft data from those objects with what Psyche’s instruments observe. Earlier this year, Psyche turned its lenses toward Jupiter and Mars for calibration — each has a spectrum more reddish than the bluer tones of Earth.

That checkout also proved a success.

To determine whether the imager’s performance is changing, scientists also compare data from the different tests. That way, when the spacecraft slips into orbit around Psyche, scientists can be sure that the instrument behaves as expected.

“After this, we may look at Saturn or Vesta to help us continue to test the imagers,” said Jim Bell, the Psyche imager instrument lead at Arizona State University in Tempe. “We’re sort of collecting Solar System ‘trading cards’ from these different bodies and running them through our calibration pipeline to make sure we’re getting the right answers.”

Strong and Sturdy

The imager wasn’t the only instrument that got a successful checkout in late July: The mission team also put the spacecraft’s magnetometer and the gamma-ray and neutron spectrometer through a gamut of tests — something they do every six months.

“We are up and running, and everything is working well,” said Bob Mase, the mission’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “We’re on target to fly by Mars in May 2026, and we are accomplishing all of our planned activities for cruise.”

That flyby is the spacecraft’s next big milestone, when it will use the Red Planet’s gravity as a slingshot to help the spacecraft get to the asteroid Psyche. That will mark Psyche’s first of two planned loops around the Solar System and 1 billion miles (1.6 billion kilometers) since launching from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in October 2023.

Source: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

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NASA / JPL - Caltech / ASU

Discoveries Are Still Being Made About Dawn's Dwarf Planet Home in the Asteroid Belt...

NASA / JPL - Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA

NASA: Ceres May Have Had Long-Standing Energy to Fuel Habitability (News Release)

The dwarf planet is cold now, but new research paints a picture of Ceres hosting a deep, long-lived energy source that may have maintained habitable conditions in the past.

New NASA research has found that Ceres may have had a lasting source of chemical energy: the right types of molecules needed to fuel some microbial metabolisms. Although there is no evidence that microorganisms ever existed on Ceres, the finding supports theories that this intriguing dwarf planet, which is the largest body in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, may have once had conditions suitable to support single-celled lifeforms.

Science data from NASA’s Dawn mission, which ended in 2018, previously showed that the bright, reflective regions on Ceres’ surface are mostly made of salts left over from liquid that percolated up from underground. Later analysis in 2020 found that the source of this liquid was an enormous reservoir of brine, or salty water, below the surface. In other research, the Dawn mission also revealed evidence that Ceres has organic material in the form of carbon molecules — essential, though not sufficient on its own, to support microbial cells.

The presence of water and carbon molecules are two critical pieces of the habitability puzzle on Ceres. The new findings offer the third: a long-lasting source of chemical energy in Ceres’ ancient past that could have made it possible for microorganisms to survive. This result does not mean that Ceres had life, but rather, that there likely was “food” available should life have ever arisen on Ceres.

In the study, published in Science Advances on August 20, the authors built thermal and chemical models mimicking the temperature and composition of Ceres’ interior over time. They found that 2.5 billion years or so ago, Ceres’ subsurface ocean may have had a steady supply of hot water containing dissolved gases traveling up from metamorphosed rocks in the rocky core. The heat came from the decay of radioactive elements within the dwarf planet’s rocky interior that occurred when Ceres was young — an internal process thought to be common in our Solar System.

“On Earth, when hot water from deep underground mixes with the ocean, the result is often a buffet for microbes — a feast of chemical energy. So it could have big implications if we could determine whether Ceres’ ocean had an influx of hydrothermal fluid in the past,” said Sam Courville, lead author of the study. Now based at Arizona State University in Tempe, he led the research while working as an intern at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, which also managed the Dawn mission.

Catching Chill

The Ceres that we know today is unlikely to be habitable. It is cooler, with more ice and less water than in the past. There is currently insufficient heat from radioactive decay within Ceres to keep the water from freezing, and what liquid remains has become a concentrated brine.

The period when Ceres would most likely have been habitable was between a half-billion and 2 billion years after it formed (or about 2.5 billion to 4 billion years ago), when its rocky core reached its peak temperature. That’s when warm fluids would have been introduced into Ceres’ underground water.

The dwarf planet also doesn’t have the benefit of present-day internal heating generated by the push and pull of orbiting a large planet, like Saturn’s moon Enceladus and Jupiter’s moon Europa do. So Ceres’ greatest potential for habitability-fueling energy was in the past.

This result has implications for water-rich objects throughout the outer Solar System, too. Many of the other icy moons and dwarf planets that are of similar size to Ceres (about 585 miles, or 940 kilometers, in diameter) and don’t have significant internal heating from the gravitational pull of planets could have also had a period of habitability in their past.

Source: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

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NASA / JPL - Caltech

JWST Update #2: A New Satellite Is Found at the Third Outer Planet in our Solar System...

NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, M. El Moutamid (SwRI), M. Hedman (University of Idaho)

New Moon Discovered Orbiting Uranus Using NASA’s Webb Telescope (News Release)

Editor’s Note: This post highlights data from Webb science in progress, which has not yet been through the peer-review process.

Using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, a team led by the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) has identified a previously-unknown moon orbiting Uranus, expanding the planet’s known satellite family to 29. The detection was made during a Webb observation on February 2, 2025.

“This object was spotted in a series of 10 40-minute long-exposure images captured by the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam),” said Maryame El Moutamid, a lead scientist in SwRI’s Solar System Science and Exploration Division based in Boulder, Colorado. “It’s a small moon but a significant discovery, which is something that even NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft didn’t see during its flyby nearly 40 years ago.”

The newly-discovered moon is estimated to be just six miles (10 kilometers) in diameter, assuming that it has a similar reflectivity (albedo) to Uranus’ other small satellites. That tiny size likely rendered it invisible to Voyager 2 and other telescopes.

“No other planet has as many small inner moons as Uranus, and their complex inter-relationships with the rings hint at a chaotic history that blurs the boundary between a ring system and a system of moons,” said Matthew Tiscareno of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, a member of the research team. “Moreover, the new moon is smaller and much fainter than the smallest of the previously-known inner moons, making it likely that even more complexity remains to be discovered.”

The new moon is the 14th member of the intricate system of small moons orbiting inward of the largest moons Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon. (All of the moons of Uranus are named after characters from Shakespeare and Alexander Pope.)

“It’s located about 35,000 miles (56,000 kilometers) from Uranus’ center, orbiting the planet’s equatorial plane between the orbits of Ophelia (which is just outside of Uranus’ main ring system) and Bianca,” said El Moutamid. “Its nearly-circular orbit suggests it may have formed near its current location.”

A name for the newly-found moon will need to be approved by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), the leading authority in assigning official names and designations to astronomical objects.

“Through this and other programs, Webb is providing a new eye on the outer Solar System. This discovery comes as part of Webb’s General Observer program, which allows scientists worldwide to propose investigations using the telescope’s cutting-edge instruments. The NIRCam instrument’s high resolution and infrared sensitivity make it especially adept at detecting faint, distant objects that were beyond the reach of previous observatories,” said El Moutamid.

“Looking forward, the discovery of this moon underscores how modern astronomy continues to build upon the legacy of missions like Voyager 2, which flew past Uranus on January 24, 1986, and gave humanity its first close-up look at this mysterious world. Now, nearly four decades later, the James Webb Space Telescope is pushing that frontier even farther.”

Source: NASA.Gov

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JWST Update: A Rocky Alien World May Not Be Potentially Habitable, After All...

NASA, ESA, CSA, Joseph Olmsted (STScI)

Webb Narrows Atmospheric Possibilities for Earth-sized Exoplanet TRAPPIST-1 d (News Release - August 13)

The exoplanet TRAPPIST-1 d intrigues astronomers looking for possible habitable worlds beyond our Solar System because it is similar in size to Earth, rocky, and resides in an area around its star where liquid water on its surface is theoretically possible. But according to a new study using data from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, it does not have an Earth-like atmosphere.

“Ultimately, we want to know if something like the environment we enjoy on Earth can exist elsewhere, and under what conditions. While NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is giving us the ability to explore this question in Earth-sized planets for the first time, at this point we can rule out TRAPPIST-1 d from a list of potential Earth twins or cousins,” said Caroline Piaulet-Ghorayeb of the University of Chicago and Trottier Institute for Research on Exoplanets (IREx) at Université de Montréal, lead author of the study published in The Astrophysical Journal.

Planet TRAPPIST-1 d

The TRAPPIST-1 system is located 40 light-years away and was revealed as the record-holder for most Earth-sized rocky planets around a single star in 2017, thanks to data from NASA’s retired Spitzer Space Telescope and other observatories. Due to that star being a dim, relatively cold red dwarf, the “habitable zone” or “Goldilocks zone” – where the planet’s temperature may be just right, such that liquid surface water is possible – lies much closer to the star than in our Solar System. TRAPPIST-1 d, the third planet from the red dwarf star, lies on the cusp of that temperate zone, yet its distance to its star is only 2 percent of Earth’s distance from the Sun.

TRAPPIST-1 d completes an entire orbit around its star, its year, in only four Earth days.

Webb’s NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) instrument did not detect molecules from TRAPPIST-1 d that are common in Earth’s atmosphere, like water, methane or carbon dioxide. However, Piaulet-Ghorayeb outlined several possibilities for the exoplanet that remain open for follow-up study.

“There are a few potential reasons why we don’t detect an atmosphere around TRAPPIST-1 d. It could have an extremely thin atmosphere that is difficult to detect, somewhat like Mars. Alternatively, it could have very thick, high-altitude clouds that are blocking our detection of specific atmospheric signatures — something more like Venus. Or, it could be a barren rock, with no atmosphere at all,” Piaulet-Ghorayeb said.

The Star TRAPPIST-1

No matter what the case may be for TRAPPIST-1 d, it’s tough being a planet in orbit around a red dwarf star. TRAPPIST-1, the host star of the system, is known to be volatile, often releasing flares of high-energy radiation with the potential to strip off the atmospheres of its small planets, especially those orbiting most closely. Nevertheless, scientists are motivated to seek signs of atmospheres on the TRAPPIST-1 planets because red dwarf stars are the most common stars in our galaxy.

If planets can hold on to an atmosphere here, under waves of harsh stellar radiation, they could, as the saying goes, make it anywhere.

“Webb’s sensitive infrared instruments are allowing us to delve into the atmospheres of these smaller, colder planets for the first time,” said Björn Benneke of IREx at Université de Montréal, a co-author of the study. “We’re really just getting started using Webb to look for atmospheres on Earth-sized planets, and to define the line between planets that can hold onto an atmosphere, and those that cannot.”

The Outer TRAPPIST-1 Planets

Webb observations of the outer TRAPPIST-1 planets are ongoing, which hold both potential and peril. On the one hand, Benneke said, planets e, f, g, and h may have better chances of having atmospheres because they are further away from the energetic eruptions of their host star. However, their distance and colder environment will make atmospheric signatures more difficult to detect, even with Webb’s infrared instruments.

“All hope is not lost for atmospheres around the TRAPPIST-1 planets,” Piaulet-Ghorayeb said. “While we didn’t find a big, bold atmospheric signature at planet d, there is still potential for the outer planets to be holding onto a lot of water and other atmospheric components.”

“As NASA leads the way in searching for life outside our Solar System, one of the most important avenues we can pursue is understanding which planets retain their atmospheres, and why,” said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has pushed our capabilities for studying exoplanet atmospheres further than ever before, beyond extreme worlds to some rocky planets – allowing us to begin confirming theories about the kind of planets that may be potentially habitable. This important groundwork will position our next missions, like NASA’s Habitable Worlds Observatory, to answer a universal question: Are we alone?”

Source: NASA.Gov

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NASA / JPL - Caltech

Europe's Newest Rocket Has Flawlessly Embarked on its Third Flight as Well...

ESA - S. Corvaja

With Ariane 6, Arianespace Successfully Launches Metop-SGA1 Satellite (Press Release - August 13)

On August 12, 2025 at 9:37 p.m. local time in Kourou, French Guiana (00:37 a.m. UTC, 2:37 a.m. CEST, on August 13), Ariane 6 lifted off from Europe's Spaceport carrying EUMETSAT's Metop-SGA1 satellite.

With this second commercial flight, Ariane 6, the new European heavy-lift launcher operated by Arianespace, successfully placed Metop-SGA1 into a Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) at an altitude of 800 km. Spacecraft separation occurred 1 hour and 4 minutes after lift-off.

A few minutes after separation, EUMETSAT successfully acquired signals from the satellite.

David Cavaillolès, CEO of Arianespace, declared: "Tonight, Arianespace has successfully launched EUMETSAT's Metop-SGA1 satellite, on board Ariane 6. The first of the next generation of European polar-orbiting weather satellites, Metop-SGA1 notably hosts the Copernicus programme Sentinel-5 atmospheric monitoring mission. This success pinpoints our dedication to ensuring Europe's autonomous and reliable access to space while also supporting an ambitious environmental mission that will provide cutting-edge data for weather and climate monitoring.

"Ariane 6's second commercial launch marks a significant milestone in our journey. We extend our gratitude to EUMETSAT and to all our partners across Europe for their trust and collaboration, driving Arianespace to deliver the utmost excellence."

"The success of this second commercial launch confirms the performance, reliability and precision of Ariane 6. Once again, the new European heavy-lift launcher meets Europe's needs, ensuring sovereign access to space," said Martin Sion, CEO of ArianeGroup. "The next rockets are well advanced in production thanks to the teams to whom I express my gratitude for their unwavering commitment.

"This demonstrates the ramp up taking place in ArianeGroup's plants and those of our industrial partners."

Phil Evans, Director-General of EUMETSAT, commented: “Extreme weather has cost Europe hundreds of billions of euros and tens of thousands of lives over the past 40 years—storms like Boris, Daniel and Hans, record heatwaves and fierce wildfires are just the latest reminders. The launch of Metop-SGA1 is a major step forward in giving national weather services in our member states sharper tools to save lives, protect property, and build resilience against the climate crisis. These positive impacts will be felt even beyond that and over the Atlantic, as Metop-SGA1 is Europe's first contribution to the Joint Polar System with NOAA.

"This milestone reflects years of teamwork across EUMETSAT, ESA, the EU, CNES, DLR, Airbus, Thales Alenia Space and many others. This is the beginning of an exciting new chapter as we work to ensure the satellite settles into orbit and starts delivering the vital data it was built to provide.”

For this second commercial mission, the Ariane 6 vehicle was in the two-booster Ariane 62 configuration with a short fairing.

Ariane 6 is a program developed within the framework of the European Space Agency (ESA). As prime contractor and design authority for the launcher, ArianeGroup is responsible for development and production alongside its industrial partners. Ariane 6 is marketed and operated by Arianespace.

The Metop-SGA1 (Second Generation A1) satellite will be the first of the next generation of European polar-orbiting weather satellites. Metop-SGA1 will host a total of six atmospheric sounding and imaging instrument missions that will provide optical, infrared and microwave observations-essential data for weather forecasting, climate monitoring, and a wide range of other services and applications. Amongst its hosts, Metop-SGA1 will carry the new Sentinel-5 atmospheric monitoring mission, part of the European Commission's Copernicus programme.

The spacecraft was built by Airbus Defence and Space, under a contract with the European Space Agency, and will be operated throughout its lifetime by EUMETSAT, which will also distribute its data to users.

Source: Arianespace

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ESA - M. Pédoussaut