Ariane

The first Ariane rocket launched as early as Christmas Eve 1979. Europe was thus responding to the need to place its own satellites into orbit without depending on the United States. Ariane 1 through 4 followed, and in 1996 came a major generational change — the heavy-lift Ariane 5. Its very first flight on 4 June 1996 ended in failure: shortly after launch the rocket veered off course and had to be destroyed because of an error in its control software. After modifications, however, Ariane 5 became one of the most reliable rockets in the world. Until its retirement in July 2023 it launched a total of 117 times and in its final years flew without a single failure.

Ariane 5 was a heavy-lift rocket about 52 metres tall, able to carry roughly 10 tonnes to geostationary transfer orbit — often two large telecommunications satellites at once. Besides commercial launches it flew several iconic science missions: on 25 December 2021 it launched the James Webb Space Telescope, the largest and most sensitive space telescope in history, and the precision of the launch saved it fuel and extended its planned lifetime. Between 2008 and 2014 Ariane 5 also launched, five times, the European Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), which delivered propellant, water, air and supplies to the International Space Station and additionally used its engines to boost the station to a higher orbit.

Ariane 6 is the new generation of European launcher, designed to be more flexible and cheaper than its predecessor. It made its first flight on 9 July 2024 from the Kourou spaceport. It flies in two configurations: the lighter Ariane 62 with two solid-propellant boosters and the more powerful Ariane 64 with four. A key innovation is the upper stage with its Vinci engine, which can be restarted in space, so it can deliver multiple payloads to different orbits during a single flight. In its most powerful form Ariane 6 can carry over 20 tonnes to low Earth orbit. The Ariane rockets are operated for ESA by Arianespace, and built by ArianeGroup.

All Ariane rockets launch from the Guiana Space Centre (CSG) near the town of Kourou in French Guiana, on the north-eastern coast of South America. Its location just a few degrees north of the equator is a great advantage: Earth's rotation gives an eastbound rocket extra speed at launch, so it can carry more payload to a given orbit than from sites farther from the equator. Europe has used the spaceport since the 1970s, and besides Ariane rockets, smaller European launchers fly from there too.