Update: July 6, 9:24 a.m. ET: Ariane 5 successfully lifted off at 6:00 p.m. ET on Wednesday, delivering its payloads to space. The mission lasted for 33 minutes, ending a spectacular 27-year run for the European rocket.
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Original article follows.
After nearly three decades of delivering precious payloads to space—including the Webb Telescope—the Ariane 5 rocket is set for retirement, and at a time when Europe is struggling to gain access to the final frontier.
French company Arianespace will launch its heavy-lift launch vehicle on Wednesday during a 90-minute launch window that opens at 6:00 p.m. ET. Ariane 5 will liftoff for the last time from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, and its bittersweet launch will be aired live. The broadcast will begin at 5:30 p.m. ET through Arianespace’s YouTube Channel and you can also tune in through the feed below.
For its last mission, Ariane 5 will deliver two satellites to a geostationary transfer orbit, which is a path that will allow them to reach a geostationary orbit at an altitude of around 22,300 miles (35,800 kilometers) directly above Earth’s equator, using their own propulsion systems. One of the payloads is a communications satellite belonging to the German Space Agency while the other is a French military telecommunications system.
It’s been a long—and largely successful—run for Europe’s workhorse of a rocket. Ariane 5 made its debut in 1996, but its inaugural launch ended in failure, whereas its second launch a year later was partially successful. Since then, the heavy-lift vehicle has launched at an average of six to seven times a year for a total of 116 liftoffs, according to the European Space Agency (ESA).
The rocket is made up of a core stage with two side boosters and an upper stage powered by a liquid-propellant engine. Ariane 5 has delivered major payloads to orbit, including the Rosetta comet probe, the BepiColombo mission to Mercury, and the Webb Space Telescope.
Ariane 5 was Europe’s main ride to space and without it the European space industry is quickly running out of rocket options, at least for the foreseeable future. The rocket’s successor, Ariane 6, was originally meant to take off in 2020, but its inaugural flight has been pushed back several times and is now scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2023. Ariane 6 is supposed to be a cheaper alternative to Ariane 5, with the European space industry hoping it will compete with SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. As an aside, the original Vega rocket remains an option.
Aside from Ariane 6, Arianespace’s Vega-C rocket suffered a malfunction in December 2022 that resulted in its destruction and its launches were suspended. This happened just a few months after Vega-C’s long awaited debut, which was meant to fill the gap in the European market. In late June, the rocket experienced a setback when a solid rocket motor malfunctioned during a static-fire test—an unfortunate incident that’s expected to delay the rocket’s scheduled return to flight until 2024.
After cutting ties with Russia following the invasion of Ukraine, Europe stopped relying on the Russian Soyuz rockets to deliver its payload to orbit. ESA recently turned to SpaceX to deliver its Euclid telescope, which launched on July 1 aboard a Falcon 9 rocket.
As Ariane 5 soars to the skies for the very last time, Europe will continue to battle its rocket woes on the ground, waving goodbye to its main provider of orbital access.
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