English: ESA’s EarthCARE satellite mission will soon be launched to answer some critical scientific questions related to the role that clouds and aerosols play in reflecting incident solar radiation back out to space and trapping infrared radiation emitted from Earth’s surface. As engineers are preparing EarthCARE for its life in orbit, the satellite is being put through its paces at ESA testing facilities in the Netherlands – the largest satellite test facility in Europe, equipped to simulate every aspect of the space environment. One of the first tests involved the deployment of the satellite’s 11 metre solar wing from its folded stowed configuration, which allows it to fit in the rocket fairing, to its fully deployed configuration as it will be in orbit around Earth. The photograph shows the wing fully deployed. Read full story: EarthCARE takes a big stretch
This media was created by the European Space Agency (ESA).
Where expressly so stated, images or videos are covered by the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 IGO (CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO) licence, ESA being an Intergovernmental Organisation (IGO), as defined by the CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO licence. The user is allowed under the terms and conditions of the CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO license to Reproduce, Distribute and Publicly Perform the ESA images and videos released under CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO licence and the Adaptations thereof, without further explicit permission being necessary, for as long as the user complies with the conditions and restrictions set forth in the CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO licence, these including that:
the source of the image or video is duly credited (Examples: "Credit: ESA/Rosetta/NavCam – CC BY-SA IGO 3.0", "ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA IGO 3.0", "ESA/Photographer’s name, CC BY-SA IGO 3.0"), and
a direct link to the CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO license text is provided, and
if changes were made to the original image or video, there is a clear statement on the Adaptation indicating that changes were made to the original content; Adaptations must be Distributed or Publicly Performed under the Applicable License, as set forth in Article 4b of the CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO licence.
#Spacemedia - Upload of https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2022/07/earthcare_solar_wing_deployed/24376865-1-eng-GB/EarthCARE_solar_wing_deployed.jpg via Commons:Spacemedia