CheopsSoyuz at the Europe's SpaceportLaunchesSoyuz Launches

Liftoff for Cheops

Credits: ESA - M. Pédoussaut

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ESA’s Cheops mission lifted off on a Soyuz-Fregat launcher from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, at 09:54:20 CET on 18 December on its exciting mission to characterise planets orbiting stars other than the Sun. The Soyuz-Fregat launcher will also deliver the Italian space agency’s Cosmo-SkyMed Second Generation satellite, and three CubeSats – including ESA’s OPS-SAT – into space today. Cheops is ESA’s first mission dedicated to the study of extrasolar planets, or exoplanets. It will observe bright stars that are already known to host planets, measuring minuscule brightness changes due to the planet’s transit across the star’s disc.

Event Date
2019-12-18
Release Date
2019-12-18
Programme
CHEOPS
Directorate
Space Science
Location
N/A
Reference
42727
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