eBay

To follow on ebay...

in my Shop "AmidesLivres"

a very nice set of photographs in Argentic print

and various printed documents

from personal archive of a high-level French aeronautical engineer,

who was one of the leaders of the "Cluster" scientific mission in 1995 (for the satellite part)

Cluster (satellite)

Domain: Study of the Earth's magnetosphere

Cluster is a mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) which uses four satellites

to study the interactions between the solar wind and the Earth's magnetosphere.

After the destruction of the satellites during the failure of the maiden flight of Ariane 5 in 1996,

these will be rebuilt identically and launched in the year 2000 (Launcher: Soyuz / Fregat - Baikonur) .

The mission, which initially lasted two years, was extended several times

and still continues.

The four identical satellites, weighing approximately 1,200 kg, fly in a pyramidal formation in a highly elliptical high polar orbit, which makes it possible to study in three dimensions the complex physical phenomena that take place in the regions located at the boundary of the magnetosphere on which

abuts the solar wind. Each satellite carries eleven instruments including a magnetometer,

one instrument for measuring the electric field, five instruments for wave measurements

and three instruments for particle measurements.

The mission, together with SoHO, which is devoted to the study of the solar wind and the Sun, is one of the four cornerstones of the European Space Agency's Horizon 2000 scientific programme.

We sell here, a important series of photographs showing

the various stages (transport of equipment, tests, assembly) of the construction of satellites

between September 13 and 23, 1995

As a reminder, these satellites have all been destroyed on launch failure

the Ariane 501 rocket, June 4, 1996

Please note, I only owna single copy

of each of the photos sold here!!