This was a once-in-a-lifetime invitation to a satellite launch party for Germany’s first radar satellite called TerraSAR-X. The launch took place in Kazakhstan early in the morning on June 15th, so that with the time difference, the party started at 2:30 am, the launch was at 4:14 am, and first contact with the satellite was made around 5 am. (Artistic view below: courtesy DLR website).
My research isn’t directly tied with this satellite, although some people at my institute had invested 5 years of their life into developing it. There were plenty of excited, nervous-looking people looking amazingly alert for 4 am.
There were periodic broadcasts from the control room (a few buildings away….but open for VIPs only) and then live footage from Kazakhstan for the launch itself. Unfortunately the Russians couldn’t get the sound connection working and we missed the countdown, but it was neat to see the rocket slowly climbing upwards. At first I was worried since it seemed to be going diagonal, but the camera was just a little titled. Cheers, sighs of relief and champagne followed shortly after as well as a live band and a German breakfast buffet completely with soft pretzels, beer, and sausages.
At around 6 am I dragged myself upstairs to my office and began to work….not the easiest thing in the world, but my commute is one hour each way and I needed to head off to a tournament relatively early Friday afternoon.
The first images and more of a write-up can be seen here on DLR’s website (my institute, the German Aerospace Center). More personal images below:
Waiting for the launch and pressing our thumbs that everything will go well (the German equivalent of crossing your fingers).
The Dnepr rocket taking off! (yes, there is only one vowel in Dnepr and sometimes people even write it Dnpr) (Photo: courtesy DLR)
What it looked like from my viewpoint….
Celebrating with champagne. Donata (to my left) has been doing shift-work since the launch to ensure everything with the satellite start-up runs smoothly.
The first image a few days after launch of an area of Russia, west of Volgograd. These are the type of images I look at ALL day long. Agricultural fields are visible as well as settlements (bright white) along the river. The bright smear in the upper left is due to extremely heavy cloud cover that they were unable to remove at the first processing.
