Aeolus launch:
When launching a new satellite most countries do not need to worry about snakes slithering into the pipes, huge rodents nibbling the cables, or jaguar slinking through the undergrowth. But for mission controllers at the European Space Agency (ESA) it is – quite literally – a jungle out there.
When the ESA launched its Aeolus wind-monitoring satellite last week it was from its spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, a peculiar European enclave on the equator, nestled between Surinam and Brazil. Dealing with extreme humidity, the threat of tropical storms and a menagerie of strange creatures may not be rocket science, but it brings an unusual challenge for space-flight engineers.
Denis Dhelft, Russian interface assistant at the Soyuz launch site, said: “We get snakes in the equipment, and we have opossum sometimes wandering into the launch facility. Bees build their hives beneath the launch towers. We have to have special moisture functions on the equipment to deal with the humidity, but the advantage of being here is we’re closer to the equator.”
The 430 sq mile base is completely surrounded by dense Amazonian rainforest, home to monkeys, lizards, sloths, armadillos, anacondas, hundreds of wild pigs, and an oddlooking, large South American rodent called an agouti, which has the front of a rat and the back of a rabbit.
Condors circle overhead while ibis glide languidly between mangrove swamps.
Jose Golitin, a telemetry specialist who has worked at the Galliot tracking station for 30 years, added: “It’s something you just have to accept working here. We have high fences all around for security, which stops [the animals] getting onto the site.”
French Guiana is possibly the least European part of the EU, and with the encroaching jungle and dated Eighties architecture, the spaceport at Kourou feels like the repurposed lair of a long-vanquished Bond villain, rather than a state-of-the art launch facility. Nowhere is that more so than at the Soyuz launch zone, where signs bark with Soviet-style severity, warning that only Russian personnel will be permitted into restricted areas. The Iron Curtain may have fallen but here the country’s space ambitions remain obscured behind steel walls.
Yet despite the incongruous location, there have been launches at the site since the Sixties, when the French space agency was forced to give up its base in Algeria following independence. Kourou is just a few degrees north of the equator, which makes it an ideal spot for launching spacecraft. As the Earth spins faster here it gives rockets an extra push allowing them to overcome gravity more easily and making it possible to launch almost twice the payload for the same amount of fuel. The Atlantic also provides a safety net in case anything goes wrong.
The French first arrived in the area in 1503, but did not establish a durable presence until the foundation of the prefecture of Cayenne in 1643. A former slave colony, the region is home to the infamous Devil’s Island prison compound recorded in the “Dreyfus Affair” and the Steve McQueen film Papillon, which recounts the escape of convicted murderer Henri Charrière.
The penal colony established such dread that French mothers still use the warning that children will be shipped to Devil’s Island if they misbehave. Yet despite the colonial undertones (French Guiana is the only site in the mainland Americas still owned by a European power) the ESA is warmly welcomed. The area has poor soils and the collapse of banana and sugar farming mean the local economy now relies on the launches, and the spaceport provides nearly 2,000 jobs.
Mr Dhelft added: “It’s not like other areas where the locals view white people as colonists. Here they treat us so much better because they know that white people were sent to Devil’s Island too.”
Areas developed for the spaceport feel surprisingly continental. Its currency is the euro and at 32,000 sq miles, it is the second-largest region in France, and the largest outermost region within the EU. In fact, after leaving Cayenne airport, you could be forgiven for thinking you were in mainland Europe. Familiar EU standard road signs line the streets and the motorways are filled with sleek Citroens, Peugeots and Audis shuttling between the spaceport sites, while the roads are lined with Carrefours.
On launch day the site is heavily guarded by the French Foreign Legion, with soldiers stationed along the checkpoints and river crossings. The French Navy patrols the 30 miles of Atlantic coastline to prevent ships sailing under the flight path of rockets. The French air force is also on hand to make sure flights do not cross the facility, while 84 Parisian firefighters work alongside Gendarmerie National.
But the space industry in Kourou has created a country of two halves. Around the launch facility the infrastructure and roads are world class. Venture off the main roads and the poverty of the country becomes more apparent. Even the routes to the tourist hotspots are riddled with potholes. Ramshackle huts line the roads, while locals sell watermelons, coconuts or hitch for rides.
Yet the satellite industry is growing and French Guiana’s fortunes are likely to rocket alongside. The region will be making headlines again in October when the ESA’s mission to Mercury, Bepi Colombo, blasts off. Snakes willing.