{"id":343664,"date":"2017-07-06T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-07-06T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/?guid=2e99ce395a4bd589a07d1f41837a230d"},"modified":"2017-07-06T10:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-07-06T14:00:00","slug":"mercury-transfer-module-solar-wing-deployment-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/?p=343664","title":{"rendered":"Mercury Transfer Module solar wing deployment"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.esa.int\/var\/esa\/storage\/images\/esa_multimedia\/videos\/2017\/07\/mercury_transfer_module_solar_wing_deployment\/17051574-1-eng-GB\/Mercury_Transfer_Module_solar_wing_deployment_small.jpg\" width=\"170\" height=\"96\" align=\"left\" hspace=\"8\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\nVideo showing the deployment of one of the Mercury Transfer Module\u2019s 12 m-long solar wings in ESA\u2019s test centre. The craft has two wings, spanning about 30 m from tip-to-tip when both are deployed.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nIn the test centre, the five panels were supported from above to simulate the weightlessness of space. The wings will be folded against the spacecraft\u2019s body inside the Ariane 5 launch vehicle and will only open once in space. Mechanisms lock each panel segment in place. They can be rotated with the solar array drive mechanism attached to the main body.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nThe module will use a combination of electric propulsion and multiple gravity assists at Earth, Venus and Mercury to carry BepiColombo\u2019s two scientific orbiters \u2013 ESA\u2019s Mercury Planetary Orbiter and Japan\u2019s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter&nbsp;\u2013 to the innermost planet in our Solar System.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.esa.int\/var\/esa\/storage\/images\/esa_multimedia\/videos\/2017\/07\/mercury_transfer_module_solar_wing_deployment\/17051574-1-eng-GB\/Mercury_Transfer_Module_solar_wing_deployment_small.jpg\" width=\"170\" height=\"96\" align=\"left\" hspace=\"8\"><\/p>\n<p>\nVideo showing the deployment of one of the Mercury Transfer Module&rsquo;s 12 m-long solar wings in ESA&rsquo;s test centre. The craft has two wings, spanning about 30 m from tip-to-tip when both are deployed.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nIn the test centre, the five panels were supported from above to simulate the weightlessness of space. The wings will be folded against the spacecraft&rsquo;s body inside the Ariane 5 launch vehicle and will only open once in space. Mechanisms lock each panel segment in place. They can be rotated with the solar array drive mechanism attached to the main body.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nThe module will use a combination of electric propulsion and multiple gravity assists at Earth, Venus and Mercury to carry BepiColombo&rsquo;s two scientific orbiters &ndash; ESA&rsquo;s Mercury Planetary Orbiter and Japan&rsquo;s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter&nbsp;&ndash; to the innermost planet in our Solar System.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":615444,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-343664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-multimedia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=343664"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":343665,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343664\/revisions\/343665"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/615444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=343664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=343664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=343664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}