The Hélios 1B was a French military photo-reconnaissance satellite in which Italy and Spain also participated. It was launched from the Guiana Space Centre, French Guiana on 3 December 1999 at 16:22:00 UTC. The spacecraft rode aboard an Ariane 4 rocket which also carried the French military reconnaissance satellite Clementine. Due to power supply failures, it had to be left to disintegrate in 2005.
It has been replaced by Hélios 2A, launched on December 2004 on an Ariane 5 rocket.
Bibliography
(in French and English)Guy Lebègue, (trad. Robert J. Amral), « Helios: The Orbiting Spyglass », in Revue aerospatiale, n°118, May 1995.
Launches are separated by dots ( • ), payloads by commas ( , ), multiple names for the same satellite by slashes ( / ). Crewed flights are underlined. Launch failures are marked with the † sign. Payloads deployed from other spacecraft are (enclosed in parentheses).
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