Engineer inspects Smile spacecraft segment

On 21 January 2025, engineers at ESA’s technical heart (ESTEC) connected the two main parts of the Smile spacecraft, putting it into its final flight configuration.

In this image we see the payload module, which hosts three of the spacecraft’s four science instruments. The payload module was built by Airbus under the responsibility of ESA. Airbus quality assurance engineer Miguel Garcia Valenzuela Parera inspects the module, making sure that it is clean and secure, ready to be lifted up and attached to the main spacecraft platform.

Find out more about the testing and integration of Smile at ESTEC

Smile (the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer) is a 50–50 collaboration between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

[Image description: An engineer inspects a spacecraft on a platform in a cleanroom. We see the internal wires and other parts of the spacecraft.]