Ariane 6 stands tall at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, how’s before it takes flight for the first time. With the protective nine-story mobile gantry building now rolled back to reveal the new rocket, fuelling will soon begin. In the background, 19 km from the Centre Spatiale Guyanais (CSG), is the 15-metre Kourou antenna.
Ariane 6 is Europe’s newest heavy-lift rocket, designed to provide great power and flexibility at a lower cost than its predecessors. The launcher’s configuration – with an upgraded main stage, a choice of either two or four powerful boosters and a new restartable upper stage – will provide Europe with greater efficiency and possibility as it can launch multiple missions into different orbits on a single flight, while its upper stage will deorbit itself at the end of mission.