Over the past couple of years, SpaceX has captured everyone’s attention with their reusable space-vehicles, which allows an affordable access to space. Europe is now developing its first reusable spacecraft, called the Space RIDER.
The Space RIDER (Space Reusable Integrated Demonstrator for Europe Return) is a project led by the Italian Space Agency (ASI, Agenzia Spaziale Italiana in Italian) through the Program for Reusable In-orbit Demonstrator in Europe (PRIDE) for the European Space Agency (ESA). Being an Italian led project, Italian companies such as Thales Alenia Space along AVIO and CIRA (Italian Aerospace Research Centre or Centro Italiano Ricerche Aerospaziali in Italian) have an important role on the development of the spacecraft.
The Space RIDER is then an uncrewed spacecraft that can take up to 800 kg cargo into a LEO orbit that will allow scientists and engineers perform different kinds of experiments and tests in the fields of pharmaceutics, biomedicine, biology, physical science, microgravity, earth observation, satellite inspection and others. The data will be later analyzed on earth.
The qualification flight will take place in 2023, and it will launch from Kourou (French Guyana) on a Vega-C launch vehicle. The spacecraft will reach a LEO orbit, in which it can stay up to 2 months developing different scientific experiments. After the mission has been completed, it will return to Earth in a controlled re-entry similar to the one of the NASA X-38. Later on, the Space RIDER may be reused for a new mission.
