WASHINGTON — Arianespace has postponed the ultimate launch of the Ariane 5, potentially for several weeks, after discovering a possible problem with pyrotechnical systems on the rocket.
Arianespace announced June 15 it was postponing the 117th and final launch of the Ariane 5, which had been scheduled for June 16 from Kourou, French Guiana. A temporary statement, made shortly after rollout of the rocket from its final assembly constructing to the launch pad was canceled, said only that there was “a risk to the redundancy of a critical function” on the rocket.
In a briefing just a few hours later, Pierre-Yves Tissier, chief technical officer at Arianespace, said that the corporate was informed June 9 of a “nonconformance” in pyrotechnical transmission lines like those used on the Ariane 5 during acceptance testing for one more program. X-ray inspections of the Ariane 5 raised doubts about three lines on the vehicle, one utilized in the separation system for considered one of the 2 solid rocket boosters, and two within the “distancing” system used for the boosters.
Each the separation and distancing systems have redundancies to make sure they operate, but Tissier said the corporate’s policy was to launch only with that redundancy intact. Arianespace then decided to check 4 lines with characteristics much like the three suspect lines, with those tests going down June 14 and 15.
“Because these tests weren’t all successful, and subsequently weren’t able to offer us sufficient confidence on the reliability of the redundancies, it was decided to not go in flight and to interchange these doubtful lines,” he said.
Arianespace has not set a brand new launch date for the mission. Tissier said the corporate would offer an update within the last week of June in regards to the progress in replacing the lines and planning for a brand new launch attempt. That means a delay of at the least just a few weeks, and maybe longer.
The launch, designated VA261 by Arianespace, is carrying two government communications satellites. One, Heinrich-Hertz-Satellit, was built by OHB for the German Space Agency, working in collaboration with other German government agencies. The spacecraft will test advanced communication satellite technologies, similar to onboard processing. The opposite, Syracuse 4B, is a communications satellite built for the French military by a consortium of Airbus Defence and Space and Thales Alenia Space.
The launch, when it does occur, will mark the retirement of the Ariane 5. The vehicle made its first, unsuccessful launch in June 1996, and suffered a partial failure on its second launch in October 1997 before an unqualified success on its third launch in October 1998. For much of its profession, the Ariane 5 was a significant player within the business launch market, able to launching two large geostationary communications satellites at a time.
With the retirement of Ariane 5, Europe can be left temporarily without the power to launch large satellites by itself rockets. Arianespace had expected to overlap the tip of the Ariane 5 with the introduction of the Ariane 6, but that vehicle has suffered development delays that pushed back its first launch by several years. Arianespace and the European Space Agency haven’t announced a brand new projected date for the primary Ariane 6 launch, but executives with OHB, which is a supplier for this system, said in May they now expected the primary launch to happen in early 2024.
The Ariane 6 delays are exacerbated by a failure of the Vega C in December 2022 that has grounded that vehicle, in addition to the withdrawal of the Soyuz rocket from French Guiana after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This has created what some in Europe have called a “launcher crisis” for the continent.
“It’s true that, for some months, we won’t have independent access for Europe into space with our own rockets, but this may be very temporary,” Josef Aschbacher, director general of ESA, said June 5 in the course of the “Investing in Space” event. He noted Vega C should return to flight by the tip of the yr.
“If, for a few months, there’s not a rocket available, it’s bad enough. I’m the primary one to call this a crisis,” he said. “But this will not be something everlasting.”