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Europe scores new planetary success: Venus Express enters orbit around the Hothouse Planet (Forwarded)



 
 
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Old April 11th 06, 09:38 PM posted to sci.space.moderated
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Default Europe scores new planetary success: Venus Express enters orbit around the Hothouse Planet (Forwarded)

Whooot! Whoot!

Andrew Yee wrote:
European Space Agency
Press Release No. 13-2006
Paris, France 11 April 2006

Europe scores new planetary success: Venus Express enters orbit around the
Hothouse Planet

This morning, at the end of a 153-day and 400-million km cruise into the
inner Solar System beginning with its launch on 9 November 2005, ESA's
Venus Express space probe fired its main engine at 09:17 CEST [0717 UTC]
for a 50-minute burn, which brought it into orbit around Venus.

With this firing, the probe reduced its relative velocity toward the
planet from 29,000 to about 25,000 km/h and was captured by its gravity
field. This orbit insertion manoeuvre was a complete success.

During the next four weeks, the Venus Express probe will perform a series
of manoeuvres to reach the scheduled operational orbit for its scientific
mission. It will move from its current highly elongated 9-day orbit to a
24-hour polar orbit, culminating at 66,000 kilometres. From this vantage
point, the orbiter will conduct an in-depth observation of the structure,
chemistry and dynamics of the atmosphere of Venus for at least two
Venusian days (486 Earth days).

Enigmatic atmosphere

From previous missions to Venus as well as observations directly from
Earth, we already know that our neighbouring planet is shrouded in a thick
atmosphere where extremes of temperature and pressure conditions are
common. This atmosphere creates a greenhouse effect of tremendous
proportions as it spins around the planet in four days in an unexplained
'super-rotation' phenomenon.

The mission of Venus Express will be to carry out a detailed
characterisation of this atmosphere, using state-of-the-art sensors in
order to answer the questions and solve the mysteries left behind by the
first wave of explorers. It will also be the first Venus orbiter to
conduct optical observations of the surface through 'visibility windows'
discovered in the infrared spectrum.

The commissioning of the onboard scientific instruments will begin shortly
and the first raw data are expected within days. The overall science
payload is planned to be fully operational within two months.

Europe explores the Solar System

With this latest success, ESA is adding another celestial body to its
range of Solar System studies. ESA also operates Mars Express around Mars,
SMART-1 around the Moon and is NASA's partner on the Cassini orbiter
around Saturn. In addition, ESA is also operating the Rosetta probe en
route to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It should reach its target and
become the first spacecraft ever to enter orbit around a comet nucleus by
2014. Meanwhile, ESA also plans to complete the survey of our celestial
neighbours with the launch of the BepiColombo mission to Mercury in 2013.

"With the arrival of Venus Express, ESA is the only space agency to have
science operations under way around four planets: Venus, the Moon, Mars
and Saturn" underlines Professor David Southwood, the Director of ESA's
science programmes. "We are really proud to deliver such a capability to
the international science community."

"To better understand our own planet, we need to explore other worlds in
particular those with an atmosphere," said Jean-Jacques Dordain, ESA
Director General. "We've been on Titan and we already are around Mars. By
observing Venus and its complex atmospheric system, we will be able to
better understand the mechanisms that steers the evolution of a large
planetary atmosphere and the change of climates. In the end, it will help
us to get better models of what is actually going on in our own
atmosphere, for the benefit of all Earth citizens."

State-of-the-art science package

Venus Express was developed for ESA by a European industrial team led by
EADS Astrium incorporating 25 main contractors from 14 European countries.
Its design is derived from that of its highly successful predecessor, Mars
Express, and its payload accommodates seven instruments including upgraded
versions of three instruments developed for Mars Express and two for
Rosetta.

The PFS spectrometer will determine the temperature and composition
profile of the atmosphere at very high resolution. It will also monitor
the surface temperature and search for hot spots from possible volcanic
activity. The UV/infrared SpicaV/SOIR spectrometer and the VeRa
radioscience experiment will probe the atmosphere by observing the
occultation of distant stars or the fading of radio signals on the
planetary limb. SpicaV/SOIR will be particularly looking for traces of
water molecules, molecular oxygen and sulphur compounds, which are
suspected to exist in the atmosphere of Venus. The Virtis spectrometer
will map the different layers of the atmosphere and provide imagery of the
cloud systems at multiple wavelengths to characterise the atmospheric
dynamics.

On the outer edge of the atmosphere, the Aspera instrument and a
magnetometer will investigate the interaction with the solar wind and
plasma it generates in an open environment without the protection of a
magnetosphere like the one we have around Earth.

The VMC wide-angle multi-channel camera will provide imagery in four
wavelengths, including one of the 'infrared windows' which will make
imaging of the surface possible through the cloud layer. It will provide
global images and will assist in the identification of phenomena detected
by the other instruments.

For further information, please contact:

ESA Media Relations Division
Tel.: +33(0)1.53.69.7155
Fax: +33(0)1.53.69.7690

Replay the press conference,

http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multime...rtion_Conf.wmv

VOI updates

* Venus Express 'talks' to Earth
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMZ7QNFGLE_index_0.html
* Venus Express main engine burn ended
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMMYPNFGLE_index_0.html
* Venus Express reappears from behind Venus
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMQPPNFGLE_index_0.html
* Pre-planned thrill -- Venus Express disappears behind Venus
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMXKPNFGLE_index_0.html
* Venus Express main engine burn starts
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM7CPNFGLE_index_0.html
* Venus Express slews and prepares to 'brake'
http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEM77PNFGLE_index_0.html
* Venus Orbit Insertion timeline
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMMM0NFGLE_index_0.html
* Looking at Venus
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Venus_Express/index.html
* ESA's Venus Express to reach final destination
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM0UGNFGLE_index_0.html

Related articles

* Venus within ESA probe reach
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEME02NFGLE_index_0.html
* And now straight to Venus!
http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMIMWMVGJE_index_0.html
* Successful Venus Express main engine test
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMVX5MVGJE_index_0.html
* First light for the Venus Monitoring Camera
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMLWVULWFE_index_0.html
* Venus Express performs flawlessly, LEOP complete
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMK9UJBWFE_index_0.html
* Venus Express mission operations update
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/ESOC/SEM780738FE_0.html
* Venus Express en route to probe the planet's hidden mysteries
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM56Q638FE_index_0.html

Related links

* ESA Mission Operations

http://www.esa.int/spacecraftops/ESO...551445449.html
* Webcam from ESOC
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMN3Y274OD_index_0.html

[NOTE: Images supporting this release are available at
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM2GQNFGLE_index_1.html ]


 




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