Deployment of MARSIS boom 1

ESA's Mars Express MARSIS instrument consists of three antennas: two ‘dipole’ booms 20 metres long, and one 7-metre ‘monopole’ boom oriented perpendicular to the first two.
The delicate three-stage phase of radar boom deployment, and all the following tests to verify spacecraft integrity, took place between 2 May and 19 June. Deployment of the first boom was completed on 10 May. That boom, initially stuck in unlocked mode, was later released by exploiting solar heating of its hinges.