Posted on March 17, 2010, at 12:53 pm .
Edoardo Amaldi
ESA MISSION UPDATE
Production of the Automated Transfer Vehicles is gearing up. After the flawless flight of the first ATV, Jules Verne, the second, Johannes Kepler, is being completed for launch later this year. Now the third ATV has been named after the Italian physicist and space pioneer Edoardo Amaldi.
Europe’s ATV space freighter proved its maturity in 2008, when Jules Verne completed a demonstration flight to the International Space Station (ISS), docked with 4.5 tonnes of food, water, fuel, supplies and equipment, served as a propulsion module for six months and finally undocked and entered Earth’s atmosphere over the southern Pacific. The ATV spacecraft are key to the Station’s logistics and operations. They are an excellent demonstration of Europe’s capability in creating space infrastructure for human spaceflight and exploration. The first ATV was named after the visionary French science-fiction writer Jules Verne, and the second honoured German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Kepler.
Continue reading ‘ESA to Name Third ATV After Italian Space Pioneer’
Posted on January 15, 2010, at 9:32 am .
ASTRIUM PRESS RELEASE
“Johannes Kepler”, the second unmanned European cargo spacecraft for the International Space Station (ISS), is currently undergoing its first flightworthiness and functionality tests as a fully integrated unit at the Astrium facility in Bremen. Preparations for the final system tests are running at full capacity.
Continue reading ‘Astrium Puts Second ATV Johannes Kepler Through Tests in Bremen’
Posted on December 11, 2009, at 4:00 pm .
ESA's ATV team wins the Royal Aeronautical Society Gold Medal in the 'team' category, London, 10 December 2009. Credits: Royal Aeronautical Society/T. Taylor
ESA PRESS RELEASE
The UK’s Royal Aeronautical Society has awarded its top Gold Medal Team prize to ESA’s Automated Transfer Vehicle operations team, in recognition of their achievement in operating ATV Jules Verne during its 2008 mission to the International Space Station.
The Gold Medal is conferred for work of outstanding achievement in aerospace.
Continue reading ‘ATV Operations Team Wins Prestigious Gold Medal Prize’
Posted on July 7, 2009, at 3:56 pm .
DLR PRESS RELEASE
In Bremen on Tuesday 7 July 2009, the second European space transporter, ATV-2 – developed in association with, and with the support of, the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) – was presented to the public. It was officially given the name of the German astronomer and scholar Johannes Kepler.
Continue reading ‘Astrium to Study Re-entry Upgrade for ATV’
Posted on March 14, 2009, at 11:14 am .
As the shuttle retirement looms large, Michael Belfiore takes a look at seven spacecraft that are either flying or under development for sending passengers and cargo into Earth orbit.
Continue reading ‘As Space Shuttle Goes, Other Vehicles to Debut’
Posted on January 26, 2009, at 10:43 am .
Rob Coppinger of Hyperbola blog has a couple of updates on Russian and European plans to develop new human spacecraft. It looks as if Russia will develop a replacement for the Soyuz on its own rather than cooperating with the Europeans. Meanwhile, ESA’s effort to develop its own vehicle is stalled for lack of money.
Continue reading ‘Russia to Proceed Solo With Soyuz Successor; ESA Human Spacecraft Going Nowhere’
Posted on September 30, 2008, at 12:22 am .
29 September 2008
Taken at approximately 15:36 CEST (13:36 UT) from the DC-8 aircraft.
ESA PRESS RELEASE
Europe’s first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) Jules Verne successfully completed its six-month ISS logistics mission today with its controlled destructive re-entry over a completely uninhabited area of the South Pacific.
Continue reading ‘ESA’s Jules Verne ATV Re-enters Over the Pacific’
Posted on September 7, 2008, at 10:00 am .
ESA MISSION UPDATE
5 September 2009
At the end of a flawless six-month mission, Jules Verne, Europe’s first Automated Transfer Vehicle, undocked from the International Space Station today at 23:29 hours CEST. The ATV has now embarked on the last leg of its journey in space, which will end with a controlled destructive re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere on 29 September.
Continue reading ‘ESA ATV Undocks from ISS, Near Completion of First Mission’
Posted on July 22, 2008, at 11:48 pm .
Manned spaceship design unveiled
BBC News
“It is designed to replace the Soyuz vehicle currently in use by Russia and will allow Europe to participate directly in crew transportation. The reusable ship was conceived to carry four people towards the Moon, rivalling the US Ares/Orion system….
“‘If ESA and the Russian Space Agency reach agreement, Europe will supply the service module of that co-operative spacecraft,’ [Anatoly] Zak told BBC News.
“This service module will use technology – such as the propulsion systems – developed for Europe’s Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), an unmanned freighter recently sent to re-supply the International Space Station (ISS).”
ESA aims for manned capsule by 2020
Flight International
“A €300 million ($475 million) three-year Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) Advanced Return Vehicle (ARV) development project, to be proposed to the European Space Agency’s November ministerial meeting, could become a stepping stone to a human transport system in 2020.
“ESA wants to evolve its expendable 20,000kg (44,000lb) ATV, which docked with the International Space Station for the first time in April, into an EADS Astrium Ariane 5-launched ARV. That cargo vehicle would be the basis for the manned system operating around 2020. ESA will design ARV with a view to man-rating it in future. The cargo version will be about 5,000kg lighter than the Ariane 5’s low-Earth orbit capability to allow for the future addition of a launch abort tower.”
Posted on May 14, 2008, at 12:53 am .
EADS Astrium and the German Space Agency (DLR) have proposed modifying Europe’s Automated Transfer Vehicle to carry three astronauts into orbit, the BBC reports.
“The ATV, which ferried just under five tonnes of supplies to the orbiting platform in April, is packed with sophisticated navigation, rendezvous and docking technologies. It also has a pressurised section that is ‘human rated’ in the sense that, once docked to the 340km-high station, astronauts can move around inside it safely in just T-shirts.
“But the ATV was not built with the intention of transporting humans across space, and a fit-for-purpose capsule would have to be developed to take the place of the current cargo section.”
If the project is approved, EADS and DLR officials believe they could conduct test flight beginning in 2013, with human flights coming four or five years later. The project will likely be considered by European space ministers at a meeting in November.
