European Space Agency
hideThe European Space Agency (ESA), established in 1975, is an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to the exploration of space, currently with 18 member states. Headquartered in Paris, ESA has a staff of close to 2,000 with an annual budget of about €3.6 billion in 2009.
ESA's main spaceport is the Guiana Space Centre at Kourou, French Guiana. It is close to the equator, hence commercially important orbits are easier to access. ESA became the market leader in commercial space launches in the 1990s. In recent years, ESA has also established itself as a major player in space exploration.
ESA science missions are based at ESTEC in Noordwijk, Netherlands, Earth Observation missions at ESRIN in Frascati, Italy, ESA Mission Control (ESOC) is in Darmstadt, Germany, the European Astronaut Centre (EAC) that trains astronauts for future missions is situated in Cologne, Germany and the European Space Astronomy Centre is located in Villanueva de la Cañada, Spain.
For more information about European Space Agency, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
News tagged with european space agency
Soil moisture and ocean salinity satellite ready for launch
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Oct 29, 2009 |
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A new European Earth observation satellite will be launched in the early hours of Monday morning (2 November 2009) from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia.
Femtoseconds lasers help formation flying in space
Oct 02, 2009 |
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The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) has helped to establish that femtosecond comb lasers can provide accurate measurement of absolute distance in formation flying space missions.
Japan sends first cargo spacecraft to ISS
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Sep 10, 2009 |
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Japan early Friday launched its first cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station, aiming for a share of space transport after the retirement of the US space shuttle fleet next year.
India abandons satellite after losing contact
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Aug 31, 2009 |
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(AP) -- India's space agency has abandoned the country's only satellite orbiting the moon after efforts to revive communication with it failed, an official said Monday.
India loses communication with lunar satellite (Update)
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Aug 30, 2009 |
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(AP) -- India's national space agency said communications with the country's only satellite orbiting the moon snapped Saturday and that its scientists were no longer controlling the spacecraft.
Europe and Russia sign Mars exploration deal
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Aug 19, 2009 |
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The European Space Agency (ESA) on Wednesday signed a deal with its Russian counterpart Roscosmos to cooperate on two Mars exploration projects, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.
Planck Sees Light Billions of Years Old
Aug 14, 2009 |
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The Planck space telescope has begun to collect light left over from the Big Bang explosion that created our universe.
Scientists Make Oxygen Out of Moon Rock
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Aug 11, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- If humans ever create a lunar base, one of the biggest challenges will be figuring out how to breathe. Transporting oxygen to the moon is extremely expensive, so for the past several years ...
Mini Gradiometer Could Map Other Planets' Gravity Fields
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Aug 10, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Although it may seem like gravity is the same everywhere on the Earth, it actually varies a small amount from place to place. Factors such as mountains, ocean trenches, and interior density ...
Scientists save India's moon mission from failure
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Jul 17, 2009 |
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(AP) -- India's only satellite orbiting the moon came close to failure after overheating but scientists improvised to save it and have achieved more than 90 percent of the mission's objectives, an official ...
105-day Mars simulation: US studies focus on improving work performance
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Jul 13, 2009 |
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From March 31 to July 14, a six-man international crew called an isolation chamber in Moscow their home. The crew, composed of four Russians and two Europeans, simulated a 105-day Mars mission full of experiments and realistic ...
Eastern Aral Sea has shrunk by 80% since 2006: ESA
Jul 10, 2009 |
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The eastern lobe of the disaster-struck Aral Sea seems to have shrunk by four-fifths in just three years, the European Space Agency (ESA) said on Friday.
Europe launches study into manned spacecraft scheme
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Jul 08, 2009 |
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The European Space Agency (ESA) said it had taken an important first step in a tentative project to build a manned spacecraft that would be launched atop its Ariane 5 rocket.
European rocket hoists biggest-ever telecoms satellite (w/ Video)
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Jul 02, 2009 |
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A European rocket placed the world's biggest commercial telecommunications satellite into geostationary orbit, launch operator Arianespace said.
Scientists bid adieu to plucky solar probe
Space & Earth / Space Exploration
Jun 30, 2009 |
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US and European scientists were Tuesday bidding farewell to the tenacious solar probe Ulysses which has been recording data around the sun for more than 18 years, four times longer than planned.
