The European space mission is about to return Aelous and theHex has just announced that the return could be at the end of July. The teams at ESA’s European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany, are in fact busy preparing to attempt an assisted reentry, the first of its kind, explains the European Space Agency. Launched on August 22, 2018, Aeolus is the first satellite mission to acquire land-based wind profiles on a global scale. A mission that has achieved important objectives also thanks to the contribution of Italian technologies – with the support of‘Italian Space Agency – such as the UV laser transmitter of the Aladin instrument aboard the mission. The laser transmitter was made by Leonardo in its Pomezia and Campi Bisenzio labs and it is the most powerful UV laser transmitter ever built for a space application.
The European Space Agency reports that the satellite is currently in orbit 320 kilometers above the Earth’s surface and that the satellite is being kept in orbit with its remaining fuel running low. For this reason, the satellite will soon succumb to the atmosphere and the Earth’s gravity, warns ESA, reporting that analyzes carried out by ESA and industry experts have shown that it is possible to bring Aeolus back through an assisted – i.e. semi-controlled – approach in an attempt to reduce the “already very small” risk of damage by any fragments that survive the journey and reach the ground.
For a semi-controlled reentry, ESA adds that a series of commands and maneuvers have been designed which, in the space of about a week, will ‘pass’ the spacecraft by deactivating the power systems and batteries and which will direct it, together to any remaining fragments, at sea. If no action is taken from the ground, ESA explains, Aeolus would return completely naturally – a common occurrence since on average one spacecraft re-enters Earth’s atmosphere per month. However, ESA teams are going well beyond what the satellite was technically designed to do to align with the European Space Agency’s current ambitious strategy for space debris mitigation and space safety.
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