Zefiro-9 ready for stacking on top of the Vega-C rocket that will take Smile to space

The third stage for Vega-C arriving at the launch pad at Europe's Spaceport, 2 March 2026.

The third stage, Zefiro-9 holds 10 tonnes of solid propellant, and is placed on the awaiting second and first stages on the rocket. Together with the fourth stage they will take ESA's Smile mission into space on flight VV29.

Vega-C is a single-body rocket nearly 35 m tall with that weighs 210 tonnes on the launch pad.

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

Smile will use four science instruments to study how Earth responds to the solar wind from the Sun. In doing so, Smile will improve our understanding of solar storms, geomagnetic storms and the science of space weather.

ESA is responsible for providing Smile’s payload module (which carries three of the four science instruments), one of the spacecraft’s four science instruments (the soft X-ray imager, SXI), the launcher, and the Assembly Integration and Testing facilities and services. ESA contributes to a second science instrument (the ultraviolet imager, UVI) and the mission operations once Smile is in orbit.

CAS provides the other three science instruments and the spacecraft platform, and is responsible for operating the spacecraft in orbit.

[Image description: A truck with a blue cylindrical cargo has reserved to the large tall building launch tower. Inside the launch tower two elements that make up the Vega-C rocket are already vertical. The sky is blue and two lightning towers resembling electricity pylons surround the building.