Space Rider

Over the course of two days ministers from the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Member States, Associate States and Cooperating States came together to ensure space activities continue to serve European ...

Space Rider is ESA’s reusable spacecraft in development. It will be about the size of two minivans and will allow for many kinds of missions, ranging from pharmaceutical research to ...

A part of the orbital module for the European Space Agency’s reuseable spacecraft Space Rider has finished its mechanical tests at the Agency’s technical heart in The Netherlands.

Over the last four months, the Space Rider team has been running a drop-test campaign whereby a full-scale model of the future orbital laboratory is dropped from a helicopter to ...

Space Rider colouring page

Artist's impression of Space Rider in low Earth orbit. Space Rider is an uncrewed robotic laboratory about the size of two minivans. After launch on Vega-C it will stay in low orbit for about two months. Experiments inside its cargo bay will allow technology demonstration and benefit research in pharmaceutics, biomedicine, biology and physical science. At the end of its mission, Space Rider will return to Earth with its payloads and land on a runway to be unloaded and refurbished for another flight.

Team preparing the plasma wind tunnel

Team placing Space Rider’s reentry module parts inside the plasma wind tunnel