Organization · Evropa (mezivládní organizace) · est. 1975
European Space Agency (ESA)
An intergovernmental European space agency founded in 1975, today uniting 22 member states. It operates the Ariane launchers, probes to planets and comets, and the European modules of the ISS.
CountryEvropa (mezivládní organizace)
Founded1975
KEY EVENTSON TIMELINE →
May 1975
Founding of ESATen European states signed the convention establishing the European Space Agency (ESA), merging the earlier ELDO and ESRO organizations.
Dec 1979
Ariane 1The European launch vehicle Ariane 1 lifted off for the first time from Kourou — the beginning of European independence from American and Soviet launchers for commercial satellites.
Mar 1986
Giotto probeESA's first deep-space probe flew just 596 km from the nucleus of Halley's Comet and captured the first detailed images of a cometary nucleus in history.
Jun 1996
Ariane 5 failureThe new heavy-lift Ariane 5 launcher broke apart 37 seconds after lift-off due to a software error (a data-type overflow in code carried over from Ariane 4). Its payload of four Cluster probes was destroyed.
Mar 2004
Rosetta probeThe Rosetta probe set off on a ten-year journey to comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, becoming the first spacecraft in history to accompany a comet in orbit and to deploy a lander onto its surface.
Nov 2014
Philae landingPhilae became the first spacecraft in history to land on the nucleus of a comet. Because its harpoons failed, it bounced twice and came to rest in the shadow of a cliff, yet it still managed to carry out key measurements.