Space News & Blog Articles

Scientists have developed a new Artificial Intelligence, or AI, technique using radar images from Europe’s Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite mission, to reveal how the Thwaites Glacier Ice Tongue in West Antarctica is being damaged by squeezing and stretching as it flows from the middle of the continent to the coast. Being able to track fractures and crevasses in the ice beneath the overlying snow is key to better predicting the fate of floating ice tongues under climate change.

ESA is kicking off the new year by inviting you to create a unique juice mocktail to represent the JUpiter ICy moons Explorer – also known as Juice – launching in April. The winner of the most imaginative recipe will be invited to ESA’s Social Space launch event in Darmstadt, Germany, where our favourite space juices will be served!

Video: 00:19:50

Recently, Andreas Mogensen, now getting ready for his ‘Huginn’ mission to the ISS in 2023, stopped by ESA’s ESOC mission control centre in Darmstadt, Germany, to meet with some of the experts who keep our satellites flying.

This beautifully crisp icy scene with a swirling ribbon of rusty red and white striped terrain connecting two large craters wraps up the year on Mars.

Image: How Hera asteroid mission will phone home

Press Release N° 72–2022

Image: Young ESA team prepare Ariane 6 passenger

Image: This Copernicus Sentinel-3 image shows the wide-coverage of snowfall in the Alps, which hopefully bodes well for the coming year.

Year in images 2022

Space companies in Europe that could create telecommunications and navigation services for missions to the Moon will be invited to bid for the work, following the completion of two feasibility studies.

Image:

Webb's picture of the month December is dominated by NGC 7469, a luminous, face-on spiral galaxy approximately 90 000 light-years in diameter that lies roughly 220 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Pegasus. 

Enjoy ESA’s Impact over the last quarter!

One ESA: now in six languages

The voice counted backwards in French from ten to one, then announced, “Décollage” – lift-off. The 15-year-long collaboration between NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency had just entered its most critical phase: the launch itself. What happened next would determine whether the James Webb Space Telescope made it into space or not.

Week in images: 12-16 December 2022

Video: 00:07:33

2022 was a year of many ‘firsts’ for space in Europe, seeing the first European female ISS commander, the launch of the first Vega-C rocket, Solar Orbiter’s first close encounter with our home star, the launch of the first Artemis mission working to bring humans back to the Moon, and first images from the James Webb Space Telescope.

At this time of the year, the mention of Lapland conjures up visions of Santa getting his gift-laden sleigh and nine reindeer ready to take to the skies for the most important deliveries of all. However, the skies of Lapland have witnessed something rather different recently – a big white balloon, which may not provide the immediate gratification of a much-wanted Christmas present, but nonetheless plays a role in helping to safeguard our children’s future.

Making satellite navigation sufficiently accurate by improving its integrity for aircraft to rely on, the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay System, EGNOS, is today employed by hundreds of airports across our continent, guiding airliners down through all weathers to the point where pilots gain sight of runways to initiate landing. Now an upgraded version of the system, EGNOS v3, has passed its Critical Design Review – putting it on track to enter service by the second part of the decade.

Dublin, the capital and largest city of Ireland, is featured in this image captured by Copernicus Sentinel-2.

ESA and OHB have signed a contract to move forward with the design and construction of ESA’s ambitious Comet Interceptor spacecraft, planned for launch in 2029.

Video: 01:03:00

Watch the replay of the media session following the 314th ESA Council meeting which takes place on 14 and 15 December in Paris. ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher and ESA Council Chair Anna Rathsman share the outcome of this meeting. Updates on the outcomes of CM22 and the next implementation steps are provided to the media.