ESTRACK

ESTRACK station in Redu, Belgium

The European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) operates a number of ground-based space-tracking stations for the European Space Agency (ESA) known as the European Space Tracking (ESTRACK) network. The stations support various ESA spacecraft and facilitate communications between ground operators and scientific probes such as XMM-Newton and Mars Express. Similar networks are run by the USA, China, Russia, Japan, and India.

Composition

Locations of ESTRACK's ESA owned stations on a world map

ESTRACK control centre in ESOC

As well as the ESTRACK control centre in ESOC, the network consists of ten ESA-owned stations and four stations run cooperatively with other organisations. The stations are:

ESA stations

• New Norcia Station (Australia)
• Perth Station (Australia)
• Redu Station (Belgium)
• Kourou Station (French Guayana)
• Cebreros Station (Spain)
• Maspalomas Station (Gran Canaria, Spain)
• Villafranca Station (Spain)
• Kiruna Station (Sweden)
• Santa Maria (Azores, Portugal)
• Malargüe Station, Argentina.

Cooperative stations

• Malindi (Kenya)
• Santiago (Chile)
• Svalbard Satellite Station (Norway)

Antennas

Each ESTRACK station is different, supporting multiple missions, some sharing one or more of the same missions. The ESTRACK network consists of at least:

• Three 35-metre diameter antennas (New Norcia, Cebreros and Malargüe).
• Seven 15-metre antennas
• One 13-metre antenna
• One 12-metre antenna
• One 5.5-metre antenna
• Six GPS-TDAF antennas

There are also at least eleven more smaller antennas with sizes of 9.3 to 2.5-metres. The antennas are remotely operated from the ESTRACK Control Centre (ECC) located at ESOC.

On 1 January 2013, the 35-metre station Marlargüe became the newest station to join the ESTRACK Deep Space Network.

The station in Santa-Maria can be used to track Ariane launches and it is also capable of tracking Vega and Soyuz launchers operated from ESA's Spaceport at Kourou, French Guiana.

See also

• European Space Operations Centre (ESOC)
• European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC)
• European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC)
• European Astronaut Centre (EAC)
• European Centre for Space Applications and Telecommunications (ECSAT)
• ESA Centre for Earth Observation (ESRIN)
• Guiana Space Centre (CSG)
• European Space Agency (ESA)

External links

• ESA Operations website
• ESA webpage on ESTRACK, including links to all stations

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