The final flight of the Ariane 5 rocket will complete an almost perfect career

That’s it: Ariane 5 is about to leave the stage for good. On June 16, 2023, the emblematic rocket of European space will rise one last time from French Guiana for its final mission. VA261, the code name for this flight, will be the end point of an operational career that began twenty-seven years ago. The sequel will be written with Ariane 6, which is long overdue.

Ariane 5 will make its farewell flight for the benefit of two satellites – one military, with Syracuse 4B (military communications, for the DGA – Directorate General for Armaments) and the other civilian, with the Heinrich-Hertz technology demonstrator . For a time, Ariane 5 could have concluded its adventure with the JUICE mission, but the schedule has been changed.

Laborious beginnings, before an impeccable career

If the career of Ariane 5 was almost flawless, it had nevertheless started very badly in 1996. Its maiden flight was marked by a failure. In question, a computer malfunction caused a sudden change in the trajectory of the launcher. An explosion followed, thirty seconds after takeoff from Guyana.

The next flight, planned a year later, did not correct all of Ariane 5’s early flaws. The mission went better, but it is considered a partial failure. It had been noted a ” excessive roll torque during cryogenic main stage flight according to a survey result shared in April 1998.

Until the early 2000s, Ariane 5 would experience two more difficulties, one in 2001 (a partial failure) and the other in 2002 (a complete failure). Then, Ariane 5 will be flawless until 2018 – when a final, moderate deviation will be identified. The results of the races are flattering: out of 115 flights, there were 110 successes, ie a reliability rate of 95.6%.

These twenty-seven operational years have seen five different versions of this launcher.

The first was called 5G (for fifth generation, nothing to do with 5G) and was used from 1996 to 2006. A 5G+ existed in 2004. Between 2005 and 2009, and between 2008 and 2018, there were the versions 5GS and 5ES. The most modern version is the 5ECA, used since 2002 (and exclusively since 2018). Ironically, it started with a failure, precisely.

The next chapter will therefore be written by Ariane 6, whose operational debut is slow – the maiden flight is hoped for the fourth quarter of 2023, but a shift to 2024 is plausible. In fact, the absence of other Ariane 5 rockets and the delay accumulated by Ariane 6 lead to a capacity gap for Europe in space. And, it does not only affect this range of launcher.

Ariane 6 should operate for about ten years, with two versions (with two or four lateral boosters, depending on the size of the payload), and thus give Europe a sovereign capacity to access space . Beyond 2030, the future of rockets has already been thought out. The next generation of the Ariane family already has a nickname: Ariane Next.

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