Guiana Space Center to reopen May 11

MT LAUREL, New Jersey — Europe’s spaceport will resume launch activity May 11 when France lifts a nation-wide lockdown that included the Guiana Space Center. 

Located in the South American territory of French Guiana, the spaceport has been closed since March 16 in an effort to slow the spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. 

The French space agency CNES said April 29 that launch activity and construction of the Ariane 6 launch pad were resuming with protective measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Those measures include “strict social distancing” before leaving mainland Europe, medical screenings for people flying into French Guiana’s Cayenne airport, and a 14-day quarantine in Kourou, French Guiana, after landing. 

CNES said 100 people will travel from Europe to the Guiana Space Center on May 11, and will start preparations May 25 for a Vega rocket launch previously scheduled for March. 

In an interview, CNES President Jean-Yves Le Gall said the spaceport’s first missions would be the Vega launch in June followed by an Ariane 5 launch in July. 

“We should be back to routine operations one month from now,” Le Gall said. 

European launch provider Arianespace had 14 missions planned from the Guiana Space Center this year, two of which were completed prior to the spaceport’s closure.

The March bankruptcy of Arianespace-customer OneWeb left eight Soyuz launches in limbo, but only two of those would have launched from the Guiana Space Center. The other six were to launch from Russia and Kazakhstan. Le Gall said the Guiana Space Center should be able to accommodate all eight of Arianespace’s other 2020 missions without issue, despite the coronavirus delay. 

“We had some margins between the launches, so if everything is going well we will probably complete the launch program as it was planned early this year,” he said. 

Le Gall said launches at the Guiana Space Center shouldn’t require more time than in the past because of the coronavirus, but cautioned it will take time to know that fully. 

Spaceport personnel will be required to wear face masks while working, he said. Masks, spacing out workers and other safety steps should enable CNES to keep the spaceport running without a second interruption, he said. 

Le Gall said the coronavirus has had a limited impact on completing the Ariane 6 launch pad, known as ELA4, because some of that work resumed April 21 with local staff. Launch pad work will return to normal after more people arrive in May, he said. 

Le Gall said ELA4 should be completed in the second half of 2020. The biggest difference between ELA4 and the Ariane 5 launch pad is the introduction of a mobile gantry that will allow access to Ariane 6 up to the final minutes before liftoff, Le Gall said. 

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