Preparing Aeolus's assisted reentry

Surpassing scientific expectations and exceeding its planned life in orbit, the Aeolus wind mission has been hailed as one of ESA’s most successful Earth observation missions.

At the end of its life in orbit and with fuel depleted, the team of spacecraft engineers, flight dynamics experts and space debris specialists at ESA’s ESOC mission control centre in Germany used the satellite’s remaining fuel to carry out a series of burns to guide the satellite down to Earth’s atmosphere for a safe reentry.

The reentry – the first assisted reentry of its kind – came after a series of complex manoeuvres that positioned Aeolus so that any pieces that may not have burned up in the atmosphere would fall within the satellite’s planned Atlantic ground tracks.