Latest European Space Agency Stories
ESA In its third year, the Copernicus Masters competition – previously known as the GMES Masters – opens once again. Submissions are now being accepted for the first challenge that asks participants to demonstrate how satellites show humans’ impact on our planet. The Copernicus Masters rewards the best ideas for services, business cases and applications based on satellite Earth observation data. With a prize pool of € 350 000 in cash prizes, technical support, data packages and...
redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online The massive backplane that will help hold the James Webb Space Telescope’s primary mirror in place as it scans the night sky is now one step closer to completion, NASA officials announced on Friday. The recent assembly of the primary mirror backplane support structure wing “is another milestone that helps move Webb closer to its launch date in 2018," said Geoff Yoder, the telescope program’s director at the US space...
April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online A free phone app from the European Space Agency (ESA), released this week, turns your iPhone-controlled "home drone" into a spacecraft. Owners of the Parrot AR.Drone quadcopter, which was recently featured on an episode of "King of the Nerds," can use the augmented reality game to attempt dockings with a simulated International Space Station (ISS) while flying their drones for real. The game adds a fun new dimension to flying the...
GREENBELT, Md., March 15, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Local news media are invited to the Maryland Science Center at 601 Light Street, Baltimore, on Friday, March 22, to cover hands-on NASA Sun Earth Day activities from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. EDT. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) Educator specialists from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. will be on hand working with 3,000 local middle and high school students on various experiments....
WASHINGTON, March 15, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A massive backplane that will hold the primary mirror of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope nearly motionless while it peers into space is another step closer to completion with the recent assembly of the support structure's wings. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) The wings enable the mirror, made of 18 pieces of beryllium, to fold up and fit inside a 16.4-foot (5-meter) fairing on a rocket, and then...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The European Space Agency (ESA) and Russian federal space agency (Roscosmos) have finally signed a formal agreement to work together on the ExoMars program to determine whether life ever existed on Mars. Under the partnership, ESA agreed to provide the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) and the Entry, Descent and Landing Demonstrator Module (EDM) in 2016 as well as the carrier and rover in 2018. Roscosmos agreed to be responsible for the 2018...
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum announced that the team responsible for the successful landing of NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover will receive its 2013 Trophy for Current Achievement on April 24 in Washington DC. “The Current Achievement winner can be summarized in two words: sky crane,” said a museum press release describing the award. “This phrase embodied the audacious plan that the Entry, Descent, and Landing team...
WATCH VIDEO: [Earthquake Sensed By GOCE] Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online Two years ago today, Japan was rocked by a 9.0-magnitude earthquake and giant tsunami that caused both death and destruction throughout the country. Now, with instrument's like the European Space Agency's (ESA) GOCE satellite, scientists will be able to understand a bit more about these devastating quakes and how they rock Earth. ESA launched the hyper-sensitive GOCE gravity satellite in...
April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The ink is drying on a brand new birth certificate for a star that's been around for a very long time. New calculations using NASA'S Hubble Space Telescope have enabled a group of astronomers to take an important step closer to reconciling the age of this star, and the age of the Universe. "We have found that this is the oldest known star with a well-determined age," said Howard Bond of Pennsylvania State University in University...
ESA An important milestone has been reached for ESA’s Sentinel-3 mission. The satellite platform has been delivered to the Prime Contractor in France where the instruments will be installed and tested along with the numerous components that make up this sophisticated new mission to monitor Earth. Once complete, Sentinel-3 will host an array of state-of-the-art instruments that mainly focus on measuring different aspects of ocean waters, such as the temperature and color of the surface...
Latest European Space Agency Reference Libraries
Léopold Eyharts is a Brigadier General in the French Air Force and an ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut. Eyharts was born April 28, 1957, in Biarritz, France. After completing his basic academics, he joined the French Air Force Academy of Salon-de-Provence in 1977 to study aeronautical engineering. Eyharts graduated in 1979 as an engineer. By 1980 he became a fighter pilot and was sent to the Istres Air Force Base in France. Initially he was assigned to an operational jaguar squadron...
Columbia launched from Kennedy Space Center on November 28, 1983 at 11:00 AM (EST) and landed at Edwards Air Force Base on December 8, 1983 at 3:47 AM (PST). The shuttle orbited 167 times at an inclination of 57 degrees and travelled 4.3 million miles. The mission lasted 10 days, 7 hours, 47 minutes, and 24 seconds. This mission was the first time 6 people were carried into space on one shuttle, and it carried the first Spacelab mission and the first European crew member, Ulf Merbold of...
Frank De Winne is a Belgian Air Component officer and an ESA astronaut. He was born Frank Viscount De Winne on April 25, 1961 in Ledeberg, Belgium. He is married to Lena Clarke and has three children from a previous marriage. He enjoys football, concerts, and gastronomy. In 1979, he graduated from the Royal School of Cadets, and in 1984, he graduated from the Royal Military Academy with a Master of Science degree in Engineering. In 1991, after graduating from the Belgian Air Component at...
Jean-Francois Clervoy is a French engineer and test pilot, a CNES and ESA astronaut, and a veteran of three NASA Space Shuttle missions. He was born Jean-Francois André Clervoy on November 19, 1958 in France. He has a twin brother, Patrick, and is married to the former Laurence Boulanger. The couple has two children, and the family enjoys racquet sports, skill games, skiing, and flying kites. Clervoy graduated from high school in Saint-Cyr Lycee and then earned his Bachelor's degree from...
Chister Fuglesang is a Swedish physicist and an ESA astronaut. He was born Arne Christer Fuglesang on March 18, 1957 in Stockholm, Sweden. His mother was Swedish, but his father was Norwegian, having become a Swedish citizen just before Fuglesang's birth. Fuglesang graduated college, and went on to receive a Master of Science degree in engineering physics from the Royal Institute of Technology in 1981. While at the Royal Institute, he met Elisabeth, whom he married in 1983. He then earned a...
![Long Day\](/media/gallery/cassinihuygens-mission/thumbs/thumbs_pia14659.jpg "Long Day\")
