ATV 5 (Georges Lemaître)

Spacecraft nº:

ESA spacecraft nº: 87

Description:

ATV-5 integration

ATV-5 patch




• Fifth European Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) to be launched towards the International Space Station.
• ATV 5 also known as The Georges Lemaître ATV, is a European unmanned cargo resupply spacecraft, named after the Belgian astronomer Georges Lemaitre, father of the Big Bang theory. The spacecraft was launched during the night of 29 July (23:44 GMT, 20:44 local time, 30 July 01:44 CEST), 2014, on a mission to supply the International Space Station (ISS) with propellant, water, air, and dry cargo. It is the fifth and final ATV to be built, following the Albert Einstein, which launched on 5 June 2013. Georges Lemaitre's components were constructed in Turin, Italy, and Bremen, Germany, and underwent final assembly and testing in Turin and Bremen. Cargo loading was completed in Guiana Space Center on 23 July 2014.
• The name, proposed by Belgium’s delegation to ESA, was endorsed on 14-15 February, 2012 by the ESA Programme Board responsible for Space Station matters during a meeting at ESA Headquarters in Paris.
  On that occasion, ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain said: "By naming ATV-5 after Georges Lemaître, we honour a world-class Belgian scientist who was instrumental in expanding our knowledge of the origins of the Universe".

Mission:

• ESA's Automated Transfer Vehicle 5 ′Georges Lemaitre′ was launched on Jul 29, 2014 and arrived at the ISS on Aug 12, docking with Zvezda at 1330 UTC. Launch mass of ATV 5 was 19926 kg.
  
  

  ATV-5 seen from the ISS as it approaches for docking in August 2014. To the right of the ESA logo, three cameras around the front cone form part of the Laser Infrared Imaging Sensors, or LIRIS, experiment that demonstrated new rendezvous and docking technology.

  ATV-5 at ISS

  
  
• The European cargo ship ATV-5 "Georges Lemaître" undocked from the ISS Zvezda module at 13:42 UTC Feb 14, 2015 and was deorbited over the Pacific on Feb 15.

Astrophilately covers:

Launch cancel Kourou - Credit: #414

Launch cancel Kourou - Guyane, ESA cover

Follow station, cancel Kourou - Credit: #401

Follow station, cancel Salisbury. Credit: #401

Docking cancel Kourou.

Docking cancel Toulouse. Credit: #401

Undocking, cancel Toulouse. Credit: #401

Landing cancel Houston. Credit: #414