Ariane-5 rocket to be relaunched in September

JAKARTA (JP): The European aerospace company Arianespace will launch in September the qualification flight of the second Ariane-5, the latest generation of rocket which exploded seconds after its maiden launch last June.

If the launch is successful, a third launch would take place four or five months after the second one, Arianespace's president, Charles Bigot, told The Jakarta Post during his visit here last week.

"Ariane will then take over the Ariane-5 project for commercial and operational affairs in early 1998," he said.

The Ariane-5 rocket, the first of a new generation of European-made spacecraft launchers, exploded in early June 1996 after lift-off from its launchpad at Kourou, French Guiana.

About 40 seconds after take-off, the unmanned rocket flipped over before the explosion. The Ariane-5 was carrying four scientific satellites.

The Ariane-5 project, jointly developed with the European Space Agency (ESA) since 1988, costs US$8 billion. The new generation rocket is expected to maintain Europe's edge in launching heavy satellites.

According to ESA, the explosion of the first Ariane-5 rocket was caused by a failure of computer software that determines the rocket's position during take-off.

Modifying the revamped software program could cost between 2 percent and 4 percent of the agency's total Ariane-5 program budget.

If the first launch had been successful, Ariane-5, designed to carry a payload of up to 6.8 tons into geostationary orbit, was scheduled this year to launch several satellites, including Indostar-1 for PT Malicak, Indonesia, in July or August.

Arianespace still relies on Ariane-4, which has a payload capacity of 4.5 tons, a far less powerful rocket than Ariane-5.

Arianespace will also launch by early 1999 the Telkom-1 satellite for state-owned PT Telkom. Telkom-1 will be the third Indonesian satellite launched by Arianespace, following the Palapa C2 satellite in May last year and Indostar.

Bigot said there had been no losses due to last year's unexpected explosion.

"This is part of the qualification phases, any risks have been projected," he said.

The Ariane-5 program is the first satellite project to gain a free relaunch in case of failure, which relieves satellite operators of the need to purchase costly launch insurance.

Previously, commercial satellite launchers had not guaranteed satellite launches. When a rocket fails, the entire financial burden is on the customers, even if the failure comes from the launcher. (icn)