The second pair of European Space Agency Cluster satellites was delivered into orbit by a Starsem Soyuz-Fregat booster launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan on 9 August.
Following their launch and successful separation from the Soyuz-Fregat, the satellites, named Tango and Rumba, were due to conduct a week-long complex series of orbital manoeuvres to rendezvous with the other two Clusters - Salsa and Samba - which were launched last month.
Each Cluster satellite carries 11 identical scientific instruments which will be used on a two-year mission to measure the effects of the solar wind on near-Earth space where high energy particles hit the magnetosphere.
The quartet will operate in highly elliptical 19,000km x 119,000km (11,875 x 73,375 miles) orbits, sometimes flying a few kilometres apart and at other times up to 20,000km apart, depending on the physical phenomena they are directed to explore.
Source: Flight International
