Posted on 12/19/2004 4:25:13 PM PST by Brilliant
KOUROU, French Guiana (Reuters) - A European Ariane rocket launched a military surveillance satellite on Saturday, the third in a French-led drive for a European "spy in the sky" independent of the United States.
The Ariane-5 rocket blasted off at 1:26 p.m. (1126 EST) from the European Space Agency (ESA) launch site in French Guiana on the northeast coast of South America.
An hour after lift-off, space officials said the Helios 2A satellite separated from the rocket. An additional six microsatellites were also released by the rocket
Helios 2A, the first of a new generation of spy satellite launched by France, weighed 4.2 tons and was built by an industrial consortium led by EADS-Astrium.
Speaking from Paris after the launch, France's Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie underlined the importance of spy satellites and called for greater European cooperation in space defense ventures.
"With Helios, our armed forces can benefit from increased capacity, more precise imagery and more rapid reaction capacity. It's also a new example of the quality of European defense cooperation."
"Space is a major challenge for the 21st Century. France and Europe cannot remain on the margins of this challenge."
"The status of being a space power has become essential to exist on the world stage," she added.
Earlier generation Helios 1 satellites launched aboard Ariane rockets in 1995 and 1999 were technically less sophisticated.
"This satellite is more precise," Lieutenant Colonel Inaky Garcia Brotons, of the French Air Force told Reuters before the launch.
"The infra-red system permits detection of human activity. It can tell whether a truck convoy is moving or halted; whether a nuclear reactor is operational or not," he said.
Defense officials said the Helios 2 generation would be capable of operating at night but still could not capture images through clouds.
The total cost of the program, including a second satellite to be launched in three years was 2 billion euros ($2.6 billion), with France footing 95 percent of the financing, the French Defense Ministry said.
Or renting it out to one of our enemies? I have no doubt in my mind that if we go all out, and we find out that France is doing something bad with that satellite, it will be "blinded" by a freak solar flare...
"Ariane Rocket Launches French Spy Satellite"
Unfortunately their volunteer holding the binoculars on the end of the rocket suffocated and exploded in the vacuum of space.
/ joke
Seriously, yes.
They will be spying on the U.S. with it, IF we don't jam it or blind it with lasers or such.
;-)
future shooting stars?
After all the spying the Soviets were doing on us, I don't expect the French are much to worry about.
I'd be more concerned with their industrial espionage and stinky cheese.
They'd be better off putting a guy with a telescope on top of that bridge they just built.
Now they will have up to date, by the minute, info on which is the best route of retreat....and where all the good surrender spots are.
I wonder if they just saw that one finger salute I flashed them on my way back from Fort Worth...
Only if the telescope wasn't built in France.
They're obviously looking for additional surrender opportunities.
Whoops!
Wonder if we could shoot it down. Not for any strategic
reason, just to piss-em off.
France has a 1.7T GDP and they spend 2.6B on this? My guess is they fund this over a few years, but?
Where is the return?
You kiddin'??
This may as well be called the 'Muslim-NK Spy Satellite.'
I presume this is to give them more advance notice to begin surrender preparations.
They view it as a money generating industry, and the government has so ordained, which is why they have a GDP of only 1.7 t.
I just can't imagine france or any of the big EUros fighting for freedom. I can imagine them fighting us through a proxy, especially the french.
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