Europe launches key SpaceX satellites into space

The American space company SpaceX will launch several European satellites into space. The Wall Street Journal reports this. In concrete terms, there will be two launches next year, each carrying two Galileo satellites.

The navigation director of the EU space agency Esa, Javier Benedicto, told the newspaper that they had recently signed a contract with Elon Musk’s company SpaceX. This covers the transport of up to four of the most important European navigation and communications satellites into orbit.

The agreement stipulates that the satellites will be launched from the US on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. The European Commission and the EU member states would still have to definitively approve the agreement.

Esa doesn’t have the resources

Europe is currently unable to put satellites into orbit itself. Since the last launch of the Ariane 5 launch vehicle last July, there has been a lack of funding for this. A launch of the successor Ariane 6 is not in sight; this should actually have started three years ago.

Galileo is a global satellite navigation system. According to the German Aerospace Center, it currently consists of more than twenty satellites spread over three orbits at an altitude of about 23,000 kilometers above Earth.

Two control centers in Germany and Italy operate the system, which, among other things, provides GPS signals for smartphones. It is said that determining location with Galileo is more accurate than with any other satellite navigation system.

Sources