Yesterday evening, from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana, an Ariane 5 rocket successfully launched 2 large communications satellites into orbit, one for Brazil and another for South Korea.
Ariane 5 is the European Space Agencies heavy booster, using 2 solid rocket motors for the bulk of liftoff thrust, and a core engine burning Hydrogen acting as a very long burning sustainer. The booster also has an upper stage used to get payloads to the target apogee, well away from Earth, with the satellites themselves making the final burns to get them into their operational orbits.
I really never knew how long Ariane 5 used it’s core engine – it’s rather impressive to see and follow (and I did follow this entire launch), and to watch the vehicle move across the Atlantic and on over Africa.
Even cooler is the fact that the vehicle is designed to launch 2 satellites at once, stacking them on top of each-other in a pretty cool way.
Check out the launch video below, and enjoy!