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threelonmusketeers, 4 dni temu w Isar Aerospace targets new launch window on 27 March for first test flight

Now pushed to March 28th.

Launch thread over on !spaceflight.

Buzztiger, 4 dni temu w Farewell, Gaia! Spacecraft operations come to an end

Sniff, our most successful scientific Spacecraft by publications. The new Voyage 2050 programme certainly provides science topics that could lead to a worthy successor.

CandleTiger, 4 dni temu w Farewell, Gaia! Spacecraft operations come to an end

we don’t want it to reactivate in the future and begin transmitting again if its solar panels find sunlight.

Why go to so much work to ensure it can never be turned on again? What harm does it do to move the satellite to a graveyard orbit and just leave it listening?

Alpakka, 3 dni temu

My thought as well, seems short sighted. Bandwidth permits from ITU maybe? Risk that someone else could hijack it?

Buzztiger, 2 dni temu w Farewell, Gaia! Spacecraft operations come to an end

So Gaia relies on maintaining very accurate pointing at the stars while measuring their position. For this purpose it uses special cold gas (Nitrogen) thrusters with very low flow noise. These cold gas tanks are now empty and Gaia simply cannot continue to operate.

threelonmusketeers, 14 godzin temu w Inaugural Isar Aerospace Spectrum Flight Ends in Failure

It might have failed to reach orbit, but it still lifted off successfully and didn’t destroy the pad on the way back down. I’d say that’s pretty successful for the first flight of a new launch vehicle.

cynser, godzinę temu w Inaugural Isar Aerospace Spectrum Flight Ends in Failure

Can’t wait for the next launch!