Cerise (satellite)

Cerise (French for "cherry") was a French military reconnaissance satellite. Its main purpose was to intercept HF radio signals for French intelligence services.[1] With a mass of 50 kg, it was launched by an Ariane rocket from Kourou in French Guiana at 17:23 UT, 7 July 1995.[1] Cerise's initial orbital parameters were period 98.1 min, apogee 675 km, perigee 666 km, and inclination 98.0 deg.[1]

CERISE
Illustration of debris colliding with Cerise
Mission typeMilitary reconnaissance
COSPAR ID1995-033B
SATCAT no.23606
Spacecraft properties
BusSSTL-70
ManufacturerAlcatel Space · Surrey Satellite Technology
Launch mass50 kg (110 lb)
Dry mass50kg
Dimensions0.6 × 0.3 × 0.3 m (1.97 × 0.98 × 0.98 ft)
Start of mission
Launch date7 July 1995, 16:23:34 (1995-07-07UTC16:23:34) UTC
RocketAriane 4 V-75
Launch siteGuiana Space Centre ELA-2
ContractorArianespace
Orbital parameters
Reference systemGeocentric
RegimeSun-synchronous
Eccentricity0.0005756
Perigee altitude581 km (361 mi)
Apogee altitude589 km (366 mi)
Inclination98.2413°
Mean motion14.94 rev/day
Epoch27 December 2016 12:15:03 UTC
 

On 24 July 1996 it was hit by space debris from the Ariane rocket that had launched the SPOT 1 satellite. The debris was in a very similar orbit (orbital inclination 98.14°) but oriented in such a way that it was going north where Cerise was going south and vice versa. This created a situation of multiple close passes before the actual collision. The objects collided with a relative velocity of 14.8 km/s, about twice the orbital speed of each, over the Indian Ocean. This was the first verified case of an accidental collision between two artificial objects in space, although there had been others "anomalous events" which were probably also collisions.[2][3]

The collision tore off a 2.8-2.9 metre (9.2-9.5 foot) portion of Cerise's gravity-gradient stabilization boom, which left the satellite severely damaged and tumbling with a limited attitude control system. Novel magnetic control algorithms were used to re-stabilise the otherwise undamaged microsatellite to regain almost full operational mission capability.[4][5][6]

The Naval Space Operations Center detected a minor perturbation in the orbit of the debris of the Ariane rocket.[3]

See also

References
  1. "SPACEWARN Bulletin Number 501". NASA. Retrieved 26 August 2009.
  2. "CO2 prolongs life of space junk". BBC News. 5 May 2005. Retrieved 8 March 2006.
  3. Volume 1, Issue 2, Sept 1996. "Orbital Debris Quarterly News" (PDF). NASA, Johnson Space Centre. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
  4. "History of On-Orbit Satellite Fragmentations" (PDF). NASA Orbital Debris Program Office. June 2008. pp. 368–369. Archived from the original on 30 July 2009. Retrieved 7 December 2013.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  5. M.N. Sweeting; Y. Hashida; N.P. Bean; M.S. Hodgart; H. Steyn (2004). "CERISE microsatellite recovery from first detected collision in low Earth orbit". Acta Astronautica. 55 (2): 139–147. Bibcode:2004AcAau..55..139S. doi:10.1016/S0094-5765(03)00062-6. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
  6. Mark Ward (24 August 1996). "Satellite injured in space wreck". New Scientist.


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