BepiColombo

Date: Fri, Sep 01, 2017 | 06:30 - 06:45 GMT | 08:30 - 08:45 CEST

Replay: Fri, Sep 01, 2017 | 15:00 - 15:15 GMT | 17:00 - 17:15 CEST

Type: ESA TV Exchange

Format: 16:9

The European Space Agency’s first mission to Mercury, BepiColombo, is now set for final thermal tests before launching to the hottest planet in our Solar System in October 2018.

Europe said farewell to the spacecraft in July when it was at the European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in Noordwijk, The Netherlands, in its launch configuration.

BepiColombo is a joint mission to Mercury between the European Space Agency and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and consists of two science orbiters: ESA’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter and JAXA’s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter.

The A-roll contains footage of BepiColombo from inside the ESTEC clean room and interview soundbites from those involved in the mission:

Alvaro Giménez, Director of Science, ESA, Hajime Hayakawa, JAXA BepiColombo Project Manager, Ulrich Reininghaus, ESA BepiColombo Project Manager and Johannes Benkhoff, ESA BepiColombo Project.

More information at: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/BepiColombo

Satellite Parameters: Eutelsat 9A at 9 degrees E, transponder 59, downlink frequency 11900.1 horizontally polarised, symbol rate 27,500 FEC 2/3.