In September 1999, France decided to withdraw from the Vega programme entirely, leading to fears for the future of the launcher. ![]() A new, higher-performance version of the Vega was proposed, but this failed to sufficiently satisfy France. However, by early 1998, France was publicly showing displeasure in the programme, leading to disputes in its funding. īy September 1998, it was projected that, if fully funded, Vega would perform its first launch during 2002. During June 1998, it was announced that ministers from European Space Agency (ESA) member states had agreed to proceed with the first phase of the development programme for Vega the participating members were France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy – the latter had assumed 55% of the burden for financing the programme. In April 1998, it was publicly stated that the Vega programme was dependent upon the securing of roughly ECU70 million of industrial investment, as well as the availability of around ECU350 million of funding that had been requested from interested member states of the European Space Agency (ESA), led by France and Italy. However, it was recognised to be a costly project and thus difficult for Italy alone to finance accordingly, international partners were sought early on in order to proceed with development. From the onset, the first of three stages would be based on the solid booster of the existing Ariane 5 expendable launch system while the second and third stages would make use of the in-development Zefiro rocket motor. This proposed launcher, dubbed Vega, was promoted as functioning to expand the range of European launch capabilities Vega would be capable of launching a 1000 kg payload into a 700 km polar orbit. Around the same time, Italy began to champion the concept of a new solid-propellant satellite launcher. Development Background ĭuring the mid-1990s, French firms Aérospatiale and SEP, along with Italian firm Bombrini-Parodi-Delfino (BPD), commenced discussions on the development of a proposed Ariane Complementary Launcher (ACL). Other participants include Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Sweden. Italy is the leading contributor to the Vega program (65%), followed by France (13%). ![]() The improved version of the P80 stage, the P120C, will also be used as the side boosters of the Ariane 6. The upper module is a liquid rocket called AVUM. The rocket, named after Vega, the brightest star in the constellation Lyra, is a single-body launcher (no strap-on boosters) with three solid rocket stages: the P80 first stage, the Zefiro 23 second stage, and the Zefiro 9 third stage. The reference Vega mission is a polar orbit bringing a spacecraft of 1500 kg to an altitude of 700 km. It is designed to launch small payloads – 300 to 2500 kg satellites for scientific and Earth observation missions to polar and low Earth orbits. Development began in 1998 and the first launch took place from the Centre Spatial Guyanais on 13 February 2012. ![]() Vega ( Italian: Vettore Europeo di Generazione Avanzata, or French: Vecteur européen de génération avancée, or English: European Vector of Advanced Generation, meaning "Advanced generation European carrier rocket") is an expendable launch system in use by Arianespace jointly developed by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and the European Space Agency (ESA).
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