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HRogge

A first draft for a wiki entry about ESA.


The European Space Agency (ESA), established in 1975, is an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to the exploration of space.

History (post wave)

When the first batches of Handwavium began to appear in small laboratories scientists did not recognized that they held the key to a new age of space exploration. When Fen were starting to lift of into space ESA was in shock as most other space agencies. Not being a direct agency of a government or the EU saved ESA from being shut down in the wake of the Professors “Reign of Terror” in the winter 2007. Before the member states of ESA could agree on new rules “to prevent misuse of dangerous substances in European spaceflight” several governments had already begun clandestine programs involving handwavium to apprehend The Professor, at great expense. Many of their representatives were forced to resign when this was revealed before this new direction was forced upon the ESA. Others were put into jail for redirecting huge amounts of state owned money for an illegal bounty against The Professor.

» Members of the parliament, let me say this again...
Our own government tried to use most of the money in our national pension and health care fonds just to get hold of a single individual known as ‘the Professor’. They would have happily driven our country into bankrupt just to stop this man. We were just lucky that no one caught this Professor, otherwise we would have got the most severe economic crisis since the second world war! I don’t think I have to repeat the number of laws out government has broken by doing this, but our party demand that the government takes responsibility for this crime and step down immediately. «
- heard during an investigation panel about the “Professor crisis” in an European parliament.

With the availability of cheap surface to orbit lifts by Fen contractors ESA stopped further development on the Ariane launcher system in 2009 and started to focus on improved hardtech systems for space probes and satellites. The last scientific mission done by an Ariane 5 launcher was the Herschel Space Observatory at Lagrange point 2. ESA stayed a pure hardtech space organization, denying all rumors about secret experiments with Handwavium.

In 2010 ESA bought SR-06 from the Rockhounds and converted the asteroids interior into a satellite maintenance depot. The ability to repair commercial asteroids in a zero-g facilty in orbit helped ESA a lot to maintain their ties with a lot of commercial satellite companies. ESA has contracts with several owners of large waved trucks to move satellites between their depot and the satellites orbit.

It is known that supporters of ESA supplied them with a copy of the first released “Whole Fenspace Catalog” after Serenity-Con, which ESA considers a blueprint to restart hardtech exploration of space. Its known that ESA has been upgrading the life support system on SR-06 several times since this.

When the Soviet Air Force announced the founding of EXFOR in 2013, ESA sponsored several scientific instruments and researchers for the Delta Pavonis expedition. Since then, ESA tried to become a permanent part of the Soviets space expeditions.

In late 2014 ESA announced that they would start testing a new generation of ion drives early 2015 to “open the solar system for cheap scientific research”. In addition to this they are lobbying their members for the necessary money to develop and build a space lift near Guiana Space Centre at Kourou in 2020.
Looks good, so far. Will you be writing a pre-Wave history summary as well, or is there a short one we can copy legally?
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

HRogge

robkelk Wrote:Looks good, so far. Will you be writing a pre-Wave history summary as well, or is there a short one we can copy legally?
We might be able to get material from wikipedia...

HRogge

Went through and did some grammar corrections & added some links. This last sentence caught my eye:

Quote:In addition to this they are lobbying their members for the necessary money to develop and build a space lift near Guiana Space Centre at Kourou in 2020.

I'm sure it's a language thing, but what exactly do you mean when you say "space lift?"
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"

HRogge

M Fnord Wrote:Went through and did some grammar corrections & added some links. This last sentence caught my eye:

I'm sure it's a language thing, but what exactly do you mean when you say "space lift?"
Damn... "space elevator", not "space lift" (changed it in the Wiki).

The construction is described in the official "Whole Fenspace Catalog" and the ESA has a base pretty close to the equator... so trying to get funds for building one does not sound unrealistic... getting the funds sounds a little bit more difficult. Wink
Ah, well. Shine on you crazy Euro diamond, then.
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"

HRogge

M Fnord Wrote:Ah, well. Shine on you crazy Euro diamond, then.
If I look back at the history all the huge projects the ESA had (without ever getting money for them), I don't think they will get the money... but I still can see their argument for not getting totally dependent on the Fen for orbital access.

But getting money for big projects has always been a problem for the ESA.
So most likely they will focus on things they already can do and improve them (ion drive tech for example) while trying to get a "lottery jackpot" for the larger projects.
Quote:The ability to repair commercial satellites in a zero-g facility in orbit helped ESA to maintain their ties with commercial satellite companies. ESA has contracts with several owners of large waved trucks to move satellites between their depot and the satellites' intended orbit.
So... the Solomon Space Agency is in direct competition with the ESA, then?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

HRogge

Bob Schroeck Wrote:
Quote:The ability to repair commercial satellites in a zero-g facility in orbit helped ESA to maintain their ties with commercial satellite companies. ESA has contracts with several owners of large waved trucks to move satellites between their depot and the satellites' intended orbit.
So... the Solomon Space Agency is in direct competition with the ESA, then?
Or a subcontractor... Wink
I see the two agencies operating in different market niches.

The ESA specializes in taking satellites out of their orbits, repairing them in the depot, and taking them back - this is fine if it doesn't matter whether the satellite is moved (which is the case when the satellite has already failed).

The SSA specializes in repairing satellites in-place - this is the option to use if the satellite needs to remain where it is (for example, a communications satellite that still has partial functionality).

The ESA has plenty of business, but has to make money on volume. The SSA gets the difficult, high-paying jobs. They'd probably come out about even at the end of the year.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012