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| | | | | | | | | Aurora: en route to moon and mars | |
Europe's journey of exploration
On 4 October 1957, humanity took its first tiny step into the Universe with the launch of Sputnik, the Earth’s first artificial satellite. Since then, thousands of spacecraft from many different nations have followed Sputnik into orbit, and more than 450 people have experienced the wonder of space travel.
Europe has been involved in space activities since the early 1960s. Programmes of scientific research, associated with the development of satellites and launch vehicles, came together in 1975 with the creation of the European Space Agency (ESA). By this time, Europe was already committed to human space exploration through the development of Spacelab, a laboratory that could be flown in the cargo bay of the US Shuttle.
Today, ESA is a major partner in the International Space Station (ISS) programme, contributing a number of key elements, such as the Columbus laboratory and the Automated Transfer Vehicle. At the same time, astronauts from most ESA Member States have flown in space, conducting important scientific research and learning how to live and work for long periods in a weightless environment. ESA is already looking further into the future, to a time when the Shuttle has been replaced and the ISS is nearing retirement.
The last 50 years have also seen European automated spacecraft venture far beyond our Earth to explore distant worlds. After the successes of ESA’s Giotto comet flyby and the SMART-1 lunar orbiter, the Huygens probe made an historic landing on Saturn’s planet-sized satellite, Titan. ESA spacecraft are currently in orbit around Venus and Mars, the Rosetta comet chaser is well on its way and a joint European-Japanese mission to Mercury is planned.
At the beginning of the 21st century, ESA began its Aurora programme for the robotic and human exploration of the Moon, Mars and beyond. ExoMars, the first Aurora mission to fly, will launch in 2016 and deliver an advanced rover to the Martian surface. At a later date, one or more Mars Sample Return missions will return material to Earth for analysis, paving the way for the next great step – the first human footsteps on Mars.
For any enquiries or to provide feedback please contact: architecture@esa.int
Last update: 3 March 2009 | |
| | ISEC, Berlin 2007 Conference ProceedingsExecutive SummaryGeneral InformationRelated links Human Spaceflight and ExplorationAurora exploration programme
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