After a day's delay due to weather conditions, the European Ariane 5 rocket launched on April 14 from Kourou in French Guiana with the JUICE research probe on board.
Source. RFI
The European Space Agency (ESA) has spent 9 years preparing the mission to Jupiter's icy moons.
This is the last launch for Ariane 5.
For more than 20 years of operation of this European heavy cargo launcher, 96.5% of successful launches have been made.
Researchers are increasingly paying attention to the outer reaches of the solar system. After launch, JUICE will embark on an eight-year journey to Jupiter and arrive at the target in July 2031, using the impulses and gravity of the planets in the Earth-Moon, Venus and twice the Earth's field.
JUICE will explore Jupiter's moons: Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa, using a powerful set of remote sensing tools and analysis of geophysical and surface data to find out whether these space bodies currently (and in the past) have the preconditions for the emergence of any life forms.
The total cost of the JUICE project was 1.6 billion euros. This is the last space flight of the Ariane 5 launch vehicle. It is also the first European mission to explore the outer solar system, which will be launched after the Mars mission.
The first phase of Mars exploration started in 2016, and the second failed due to the outbreak of war in Ukraine. The launch of the probe in March 2022 by Russian partners was canceled.
The France-Presse reminds that "the JUICE launch comes amid a launcher crisis in Europe, which has been forced to reorganize its launch system after the suspension of Russian Soyuz, delays in the commissioning of the cheaper Ariane 6 and the failure of the first commercial launch of the Vega light launch vehicle."