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Successful Launch of ESA's Herschel and Planck

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the round-and-round-they-go dept.

rgarbacz writes "Today at 13:12 GMT, the ESA launched successfully new and long-awaiting spacecraft: Herschel, the infrared telescope with a 3.5m mirror, and Planck, the CMB mapper. The spacecraft were carried by the Ariane-5, which lifted off from Kourou in French Guiana. They will stay in L2 to perform the research. This launch is one of the most expensive and important missions of the European Space Agency. Planck will measure the CMB with an accuracy more than 10 times better than the previous mission, WMAP. Because of this high sensitivity, both spacecraft are cooled to temperatures close to absolute zero by on-board liquid helium; staying in L2 is very helpful to maintain this state. Both spacecraft are designed to observe the Universe at its infancy: Herschel by observing the first stars and galaxies (whichever came first), and Planck by scrutinizing the first photons that were set free, making up the cosmic microwave background radiation."

4 of 121 comments (clear)

  1. Far out and still close to home... by yogibaer · · Score: 3, Interesting

    First emotion: Wow! Far out: L2 is 1.5 million km from Earth beyond the orbit of the moon ( so no space shuttle service missions here... ). But before I looked it up I had completely forgotten that Mars is at best still another 53 million km and then imagining the billions of lightyears Herschel will be able to "see"... I have to buy another ticket for "Star Trek" to lose this image of an invisibly tiny blue spec in a black void in my head...

  2. Happy launching by KasperMeerts · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It's really awesome this thing launched succesfully. My professor of astronomy and his department worked ten years on Herschel. I'm really happy for him.

    I hope the sattelite gives us a lot of useful information or at least some beautiful pictures

    --
    As long as there are slaughterhouses, there will be battlefields.
  3. Free Software On Both by joelsherrill · · Score: 5, Interesting

    As maintainer of RTEMS, I am very proud that both spacecraft are running our free real-time operating system on at least the Spacecraft Management Unit (SMU). These are both important missions which promise to provide us with new insights.

  4. Re:Blame rgarbacz by pwfffff · · Score: 3, Interesting

    "(which is very cold, about 270C, near absolute zero)"

    I think you dropped this: -