Jules Verne passes Demo Day One

Stephen Withers
Monday, 31 March 2008 07:36

Science - Space

The ESA's automated transfer vehicle passed its first major test when Jules Verne successfully navigated to a point 3.5km behind the International Space Station.

The ATV uses relative GPS measurements to determine its position with respect to the ISS. Comparing the readings from the ISS with those made onboard Jules Verne allows the relative position of the resupply vehicle to be determined with great accuracy.

Once the ATV reached the preset position, it activated its external tracking lights and the Kurs rendezvous radar.

ESA officials said Jules Verne "performed flawlessly".

"Having tested very successfully on Saturday the first part of the rendezvous, in particular using the relative GPS between that on Jules Verne and on the Russian Service Module of the ISS, we now have the go-ahead to the test the second part of the rendezvous which uses the optical sensors." said John Ellwood, ESA’s ATV project manager.

"This will be very interesting, but we have a lot of confidence based on the great performance of Jules Verne during the first demonstration day."

Demo Day Two is scheduled for today, March 31. Jules Verne will manoeuvre to a point 11m away from the ISS with the aid of a laser-based optical system.

If successful, docking is scheduled for 14:41 universal time on April 3. A live feed of the event will be available on NASA TV between 8am and 11am, US Eastern Time.