By IANS
Rio de Janeiro : Brazil and Argentina have “successfully” launched a rocket carrying scientific experiments, the first joint space mission ever undertaken by the two countries, authorities said.
The launch was conducted at 6.15 a.m. (0915 GMT) Sunday from the Boca do Inferno Launch Centre in the northeastern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Norte, Andreia Araujo, spokesperson of Brazilian Space Agency (AEB), told the Spanish news agency EFE.
During the 9 minutes and 25 seconds that the flight lasted, the 8-meter-long, 1,500-kg Brazilian-made rocket reached an altitude of 121 km.
At that height, in an environment where gravity is almost zero, several scientific experiments designed by Argentine institutions were carried out and a GPS tracking system developed by a Brazilian university was tested.
After the flight, the rocket fell into the sea some 120 km offshore, where it was recovered by a Brazilian air force team using two Black Hawk helicopters and submarine personnel stationed in the vicinity awaiting its plunge back to earth.
The coordinator of the experiments on board and head of the Argentine mission team, Roberto Oscar Yasielski, said that the module containing the experimental equipment would be taken to Buenos Aires so that the results of the tests can be analysed, as AEB noted in a communiqué.
The mission had been postponed four times due to adverse weather conditions during the previously scheduled launch windows.
This is the first commercial launch of a Brazilian rocket. AEB plans to carry out more launches of this kind for scientific purposes from the Alcantara launch centre in northeastern Maranhao state.
The Alcantara base is closer to the Equator, which could lessen the cost of future flights, and it is configured to launch larger rockets.
It was from that base that AEB launched its first rocket containing scientific experiments.
The VSB-30 was launched, likewise after several days’ delay due to poor weather, carrying a payload of exclusively Brazilian experiments.
On that occasion, the rocket and the experiments could not be recovered after they fell back into the sea due to a failure in the GPS tracking system.