Europe is getting a new toy for Christmas — a big one, actually: a 100 foot tall, 274,000 pound rocket named Vega. Vega, or “Vettore Europeo di Generazione Avanzata,” is a new-generation rocket dedicated to launching small satellites from 600 to 4,000 lbs into Low Earth Orbit and Sun Synchronous Orbit.
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This small launcher has been developed by an European consortium led by ELV and jointly managed by Avio Spa, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Italian Space Agency (ASI), starting in June 1998. Vega will be completing the ArianeSpace launchers family, as the little one with his single-body design with a size comparable to the strap-on booster of its grand sister Ariane 5. The rocket is composed of three stages of solid propellant and a liquid fuel upper module: the first stage called P80, the second stage called Zefiro 23, the third stage Zefiro 9 and the upper stage, the AVUM. Vega has been developed to accommodate a growing market need for smaller satellites especially Science and Earth Observation spacecrafts, needing a very specific orbit.
The different classes of small satellites are as follow:
- Micro-satellites : up to 660 lbs.
- Mini-satellites : from 660 to 2,200 lbs.
- Small satellites : from 2,200 to 4,400 lbs.
But let’s not forget the last one: a special class of educational and technology demonstration satellites, the Nano-satellites of less than 110 lbs. Those satellites can also be called Cubesats when complying with the standard of the same name.
The maiden flight of Vega is scheduled for January 2012. Vega will be launched from the European Space Port in Kourou, French Guiana, and will carry two types of payload:
- The main payload LARES or Laser Relativity Satellite, a totally passive spacecraft has been developed by ASI. LARES spherical shape contains 92 cube corner retro-reflectors allowing the spacecraft to be tracked using Earth-based lasers. Remember, that’s no moon, it’s a space-based laser reflector….
- The secondary payload is composed of one micro-satellite and seven cubesats developed by up to 250 students from universities across Europe.
The seven cubesats are:
- e-st@r, from Politecnico di Torino in Italy, will demonstrate the usage of a 3-axis Attitude Determination and Control System, which is used to control the behavior of the cubesat once in Space.
- Robusta, from Universite de Montpellier in France, will measure the effect of cosmic radiation on bipolar transistor electronics components.
- Xatcobeo, from Universidad de Vigo and INTA in Spain, will demonstrate a software defined radio payload, a system for measuring the amount of ionizing radiation and an experimental solar panel deployment system.
- PW-Sat, from Warsaw University of Technology in Poland, will demonstrate a new concept of de-orbiting mechanism to mitigate the space junk phenomenon at the end of a given satellite mission.
- Goliat, from Bucharest University in Romania will map the Earth surface using a digital imaging system, monitor in situ cosmic radiation doses and determine the flow of meteors.
- MaSat-1, from Budapest University in Hungary will demonstrate a new type of flight hardware, a power conditioning system, a radio transceiver, and a command and data handling system.
- UniCubeSat GG, from Universitá di Roma ‘La Sapienza’ in Italy, will provide in situ measurements of the neutral atmospheric density.
Vega is certainly a nice Christmas gift for all the engineers, scientists and students who have dedicated thousands of hours building this new generation launcher and the spacecrafts strapped onto it. We wish them a full mission success: Godspeed, Vega.
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