This time the date should be right. The launch of the James Webb space telescope by an Ariane 5 rocket from Kourou, repeatedly postponed, was confirmed for December 25 by the European Space Agency (ESA), Arianespace and Nasa on Wednesday.
The launcher with its payload, currently sheltered in the final assembly building, will be transferred to the launch pad on Thursday morning, wrote Stéphane Israël, director of Arianespace, in a tweet. Its launch is to take place “as early as possible in the firing window starting at 12:20 GMT” (one hour longer in Paris), ESA said. NASA specified for its part that this firing window was 32 minutes.
Understanding the evolution of galaxies
The launch of James Webb, the most powerful space telescope ever designed, has already been postponed three times since it arrived at the Guyana Space Center last October. The first was linked to an incident that occurred during the preparations for the telescope at the end of November, and the second to a communication problem with the ground system. Tuesday, “bad weather conditions” caused a further delay, said NASA.
Built by NASA with the cooperation of the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency, James Webb is designed to explore the early ages of the Universe as well as the evolution of galaxies and the characteristics of exoplanets.