Most expensive Dutch space project European Robotic Arm goes to ISS on 21 July – IT Pro – News

The European Robotic Arm of the European Space Agency will be launched to the International Space Station on July 21. The first ideas for the robot arm arose 35 years ago and it is the most expensive space project in the Netherlands.

From European Robotic Arm is an eleven meter long robotic arm with seven joints. The arm can be programmed and moved autonomously over the Russian part of the International Space Station. The ERA looks like a compass and can also move hand-over-hand, over three fixed attachment points on the new Russian Nauka module, which will be attached to the ISS along with the robotic arm.

A unique feature of the ERA is that the robot arm can be operated from both inside and outside the ISS. Outside is a panel with buttons specially designed for use by astronauts in spacesuits. The robot arm has an accuracy of 5 mm and an operating speed of up to ten centimeters per second.

The arm will be brought to the ISS along with a new Russian laboratory module. The first purpose of the arm is to install some parts of that module. The ERA can perform tasks on the outside of the space station that are now done by astronauts. Such spacewalks, or extravehicular activities, are risky and cost a lot of money. The robotic arm can also assist astronauts with EVAs, for example by serving as a sort of aerial platform.

Most expensive Dutch space project

The costs for the European Robotic Arm have risen to around 360 million euros in recent decades. The Netherlands has paid two-thirds of this. This makes the ERA the most expensive Dutch space project. The robotic arm is an ESA project that a consortium of European companies has been working on, led by Airbus Defense and Space Netherlands. That company was previously called Dutch Space and that in turn was a spin-off of the Dutch aircraft manufacturer Fokker.

Tumultuous development with a lot of delay

The robotic arm has been in development since 1985 and has had several applications. Initially, ERA was part of the plans for the European Space Shuttle alternative Hermes. That space shuttle was scrapped in 1992, but the arm survived and was given a new use in the planned Russian space station MIR-2. However, that station never came, after which the ERA was given a new destination: the ISS. That ultimate goal and the position of the robot arm have been fixed since 2005. The launch should have taken place in 2012, but the Russian Nauka module, on which the ERA will be included, was postponed several times due to technical setbacks. Last year it was announced that the launch, including the European robotic arm, would really take place in July 2021.

Launch on July 21

The launch is scheduled for Wednesday, July 21. This means that the launch has been slightly postponed; until last Thursday, the plan was to launch the rocket with the Russian module and robotic arm on July 15. However, during launch preparations, it was discovered that a number of instruments used to maneuver the module into its final position were not fitted with a protective thermal blanket.

The ERA is attached to the Nauka module, which will be launched with a Russian Proton-M rocket from the Baykonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. In just under ten minutes, the rocket puts the module into orbit around the earth at an altitude of 196 km. From then on, it will take another eight days for the module to reach the same orbit as the ISS. It is located at an altitude of about 400 km.

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