Flown from Liège Airport successful Belgium connected an Ilyushin cargo carrier, Galileo satellites 27-28 touched down successful Cayenne – Félix Eboué Airport successful the evening of 6 October 2020. The 2 satellites, each successful their ain transport container, were placed connected lorries and driven to Europe's Spaceport. Credit: ESA-P. Muller
The latest brace of Galileo satellites person touched down astatine Europe's Spaceport successful French Guiana, up of their motorboat unneurotic adjacent month.
Cocooned safely wrong environmentally controlled containers, the satellites were carried crossed the Atlantic aboard an Ilyushin cargo carrier. The satellites near ESA's ESTEC Test Centre successful Noordwijk, the Netherlands, connected Tuesday greeting heading for Liège Airport successful Belgium. From present they flew to Cayenne successful French Guiana via a halt successful Oporto Airport successful Portugal, arriving astatine their last destination connected Wednesday evening section time.
Once unloaded from the aircraft, the satellites were past driven done the tropical dusk to the cleanroom surroundings of the spaceport adjacent Kourou, wherever they could beryllium safely unpacked to statesman the satellite motorboat campaign.
These 2 satellites are the archetypal of the past batch of Galileo First Generation satellites, known arsenic 'Batch 3', made up of 12 satellites successful all. They are built by OHB SE successful Bremen, Germany, with their navigation and hunt and rescue payloads contributed by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd successful Guildford successful the UK.
Before being cleared for launch, the satellites person gone done rigorous investigating astatine ESA's ESTEC Test Centre, the largest outer trial installation successful Europe—their past halt earlier flying to South America.
Galileos 27-28 seen atop their gold-wrapped Fregat precocious signifier wrong their Soyuz launcher fairing. Credit: ESA-P. Carril
These 2 satellites volition beryllium launched unneurotic aboard a Soyuz launcher from Europe's Spaceport successful French Guiana. The launcher incorporates a Fregat upper stage, which volition transportation them to their planned 23 222 km altitude medium-Earth orbit.
These satellites volition adhd to the 26-satellite Galileo constellation already successful orbit and delivering Initial Services astir the globe.
Next month's lift-off volition beryllium the 11th Galileo motorboat successful 10 years. Two further launches are planned for adjacent year, to let Galileo to scope Full Operational Capability successful its transportation of services, to beryllium followed by the launches of the remainder of the Batch 3 satellites which are presently each undergoing pre-flight testing.
In parallel to Batch 3's completion of Galileo First Generation deployment, the caller Galileo Second Generation satellites, featuring enhanced navigation signals and capabilities, are already successful improvement with their deployment expected to statesman by 2024.
Galileo is presently the world's astir precise outer navigation system, serving much than 2 cardinal users astir the globe.
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