Europe counts down to Ariane 6 rocket's maiden launch in mid-2024
Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket launcher will make its first voyage between June 15 and July 31 next year, the European Space Agency has announced. The agency's head told RFI that the project signals the end to a period of crisis for Europe's launch programme.
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Josef Aschbacher, director general of the European Space Agency (ESA), confirmed the dates for Ariane 6's long-awaited debut flight following the success of a key test on 23 November.
Speaking to RFI, Aschbacher called the test at Europe's spaceport in French Guiana "extremely important".
"It was the so-called long-duration hot-fire test, which simulated a full flight of of the rocket," he told RFI.
"It was extremely important because this was the test where we go through the various scenarios into various steps of a flight."
Aschbacher said that the test had confirmed the rocket's Vulcain 2.1 engine was firing successfully.
Launch crisis
According to the space chief, Europe is well on the path to get out of what he has called an "acute launcher crisis".
Europe currently has no launch capabilities of its own after retiring its previous generation of rockets, Ariane 5, in July.
Ariane 6 was originally schedule to launch in 2020, but has been set back by technical problems, design changes and the Covid-19 pandemic.
ESA and its partners have together made a major effort to get back on track and restore Europe's launch capacity, Aschbacher told RFI.
"We are out of the crisis when we launch [Ariane 6]," he said. "We are on a very good path to get out of this crisis."
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