• → European Space Agency

      • Space for Europe
      • Space News
      • Space in Images
      • Space in Videos
    • About Us

      • Welcome to ESA
      • DG's news and views
      • For Member State Delegations
      • Business with ESA
      • Law at ESA
      • ESA Exhibitions
      • ESA Publications
      • Careers at ESA
      • ESAshop
    • Our Activities

      • Space News
      • Observing the Earth
      • Human Spaceflight
      • Space Transportation
      • Navigation
      • Space Science
      • Space Engineering & Technology
      • Operations
      • Telecommunications & Integrated Applications
      • Preparing for the Future
    • Careers at ESA

    • For Media

      • Media
      • ESA TV
      • Videos for professionals
      • Photos
    • For Educators

    • For Kids

    • ESA

    • Space in Videos

    • ESA Web-TV

    ESA > Space in Videos > 2015 > 01 > Testing ESA's Mercury Mission

    Free Search (3734 videos)

    Testing ESA's Mercury Mission

    Loading...
    • Watch in:
    • en
    DOWNLOAD MP4 (33.73 MB) SOURCE MOV (120.21 MB)

    Embed Code

    Details

    Open/Close
    • Title Testing ESA's Mercury Mission
    • Released: 05/01/2015
    • Length 00:02:24
    • Language English
    • Footage Type Music Clip
    • Copyright ESA
    • Description

      Europe’s Mercury mission is moved through ESA’s ESTEC Test Centre in this new video, positioning it for testing inside the largest vacuum chamber in Europe, for a trial by vacuum.

      BepiColombo, Europe’s first mission to study Mercury, is a joint mission with Japan. Two spacecraft – the Mercury Planetary Orbiter and the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter – will fly in two different paths around the planet to study it from complementary perspectives.

      Flight hardware for the mission is undergoing testing at ESA’s Technical Centre, ESTEC, in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, the largest spacecraft test facility in Europe, to prepare for its 2016 launch.

      The Mercury Planetary Orbiter was placed inside the chamber in late October for ‘thermal–vacuum’ testing. It will sit in vacuum until early December, subjected to the equivalent temperature extremes that will be experienced in Mercury orbit.

      Liquid nitrogen runs through the walls of the chamber to recreate the chill of empty space, while an array of lamps focuses simulated sunlight 10 times more intense than on Earth.


    TAGS

    Open/Close
    • Click on the tags to find the matching videos.
    • Activity Space Science
    • Mission BepiColombo
    • Location ESTEC, Netherlands
    • Action Testing
    • Keywords ESTEC Test Centre, LSS, LSS (Large Space Simulator), Mercury, Space Exploration, Space science, Test Centre, Test engineers , Testing, Thermal Vacuum Test

    TAGS

    Open/Close

    Details

    Open/Close

    Rate this

    Views

    Comments

    Share

    • Currently 4.5 out of 5 Stars.
    • 1
    • 2
    • 3
    • 4
    • 5

    Rating: 4.7/5 (30 votes cast)

    Thank you for rating!

    You have already rated this page, you can only rate it once!

    Your rating has been changed, thanks for rating!

    8171 0
    Tweet

    COMMENTS

    Open/Close

    COMMENTS

    Open/Close

    RELATED VIDEOS

    • 01 August 2017 BepiColombo prepares for Mercury 1263 Votes: 5
    • 03 February 2017 BepiColombo status 1148 Votes: 6

    USING OUR VIDEOS

    Terms and Conditions

    Help

    Contact us

    Commenting guidelines

    • Connect with us
    • Subscribe
    • mobile version
    • LATEST ARTICLES
    • · Walking on the Moon – underwater
    • · Storm hunter in position
    • · Mars impact crater or supervolcano?
    • · Top tomatoes thanks to Mars missions
    • · Mars Express v2.0
    • FAQ

    • Site Map

    • Contacts

    • Terms and conditions