Next Arianespace Vega Launch, VV23, Planned for October 4
Next Arianespace Vega Launch, VV23, Planned for October 4
Twelve Payloads will be Placed in Orbit
The next Arianespace mission is targeted on Wednesday, October 4, 2023 at 10:36 p.m. local time (October 5, 01:36 a.m. UTC), from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana with a Vega launcher. The mission, called VV23, will place its passengers into sun-synchronous orbit.
The mission will launch two primary payloads and 10 auxiliary payloads into orbit. The two primary payloads, THEOS-2 AND FORMOSAT-7R/TRITON will be placed in sun-synchronous orbits.
THEOS-2 (THailand Earth Observation System-2) is a high-resolution Earth observation optical satellite, part of the next-generation national geo-information system provided by Airbus Defence and Space to support the Kingdom of Thailand’s key development priorities. Delivering 0.5-meter ground resolution imagery, this end to end system will complement THEOS-1, launched in 2008 for Thailand, one of the few nations in the world able to fully exploit geo-information for societal benefits.
FORMOSAT-7R/TRITON, developed by the Taiwanese Space Agency (TASA), is equipped with the Global Navigation Satellite System-Reflectometry (GNSS-R), which collects signals that bounce off the sea surface. It helps scientists calculate the wind field over the oceans. This data will be shared with the global meteorology community, contributing to the forecast of typhoon intensity and trajectory.