The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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Musician Jeff Wayne, composer of the classic album version of The War of the Worlds, encountering a real-life equivalent of a heat-ray generator during a tour of ESA’s technical heart.
In the H.G. Wells tale of alien invasion, martians use heat rays to fight their way across Victorian England. This is a rear view of ESA’s largest solar simulator, which uses 19 IMAX-class xenon lamps to cast a concentrated beam of sunshine into Europe’s largest vacuum chamber: the Large Space Simulator, at the ESTEC Test Centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands.
Satellites sit inside the chamber for weeks at a time, in the simulated vacuum and temperature extremes of space, including the unfiltered sunlight of Earth orbit – or, with modifications, as experienced around Venus or Mercury.
A long-time space enthusiast, Jeff Wayne took the opportunity to tour ESTEC on 13 October, taking a break from preparing for the live arena version of his musical show in Amsterdam, the last ever in the Netherlands, on 16 December. A fitting way to mark this event!