Successful Orbit Insertion!
Earth's Evil Twin has a new orbiter.
BBC Story
The press conference seemed oversubscribed (and only available in WMP), but should replay later for those who want to check the
ESA TV Previous Transmissions Page
Space.com story
Quote:
The initial nine-day orbit is designed to be highly elliptical ranging from an altitude of between 248 miles (400 kilometers) and 217,479 miles (350,000 kilometers) above Venus' surface, and gives the probe its only view of the entire planet’s disk during its mission, mission managers have said. Two more burns will be conducted in the coming days to bring the orbit into its operational altitude of between 155 miles (250 kilometers) and 41,010 miles (66,000 kilometers).
Venus Express is not expected to begin full operations until mid-May, but mission managers will begin switching the probe’s seven observing instruments by Wednesday with the first image to arrive on Thursday, ESA officials said.
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