Ever since the first flight of the well known expendable launching system Ariane 5 that is used to transfer payload to low earth orbit, there has been no stop to its success except the initial failure. After a series of 40 consecutive successes of Ariane 5, the powerful heavy-lift European rocket has now made a 42nd successful flight to the geo stationary transfer orbit. This was the sixth and the final mission of this year. This mission was aimed to place 2 satellites on the low earth orbit which Ariane 5 did successfully. The launcher was powered from the coast of South America at 2127 GMT or 1827 Local time. The French Guiana Kourou spaceport was used to power the rocket skyward with high up thrust.
The biggest p(–foul word(s) removed–)enger of Ariane 5 was the 5,300 kilogram Hispasat-1E. This enormous platform was intended to provide high quality video and data communication services to Americas and more importantly Europe. The other member of the flight, i.e. the 2,700 kilogram Koreasat 6 was intended to handle the services related to telecom for South Korea.
The Heavy Launch Vehicle has been designed to sustain the sever conditions and reduce the propagation delays in long distance communication. It is able to carry a 16,000 kg payload to Low Earth Orbit. It approximately requires a 6,470 kilo Newton thrust. The burn time of Ariane 5 can be up to 16 minutes.
The CEO and chairman of Arianespace France Jean-Yves Le Gal said that that out of the total 20 big telecommunication satellites worldwide, 12 have been launched by the 41 successful Ariane missions in this year. He also said that this marvel of the Arianespace team has benefited them with 60% market share.
The flight number for this last mission of 2010 was V-199. The configuration for this mission was 5ECA with a serial number of 557. Prior to this, Intelsat 17 and HYLAS 1 were used to successfully transfer the payload.
The future of Ariane 5 is likely to begin in February 2010 which would be basically a re-supply mission designed to fuel the International Space Station. The current date for this flight is 15th February. ATV2-Johannes Kepler, Europe’s 20-tonne space freighter will be sent to the Low Earth Orbit. The team says that after the freighter will go to the orbiting outpost using its own thrusters.
The serial for the forth coming mission is 544 and the flight number is V-200. The model for the upcoming Ariane mission is Ariane 5ES. The team says that it would be carrying food, equipment, air and over 6000 kilogram of fuel for the astronauts of space station. The Ariane project seems to be unstoppable.