Europe launches maiden flight of Ariane 6 rocket
CBSN
Running years behind schedule, Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket blasted off on its maiden flight Tuesday, thundering away from the European Space Agency's jungle launch site in French Guiana in a bid to restore independent European access to space.
Facing increasingly stiff international competition, Europe's space agencies see the Ariane 6 as critical to re-establishing and maintaining their foothold in low-Earth orbit and beyond, launching European military satellites, science missions, navigation and communications satellites and other commercial payloads.
"Ariane 6 will power Europe into space," ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher said in a post on X. "This is just the first step, we have lots of work to do yet, but we are laser-focused on changing the future of the European space transportation ecosystem."
Warsaw, Poland — Stanislawa Wasilewska was 42 when she was captured by Nazi German troops on Aug. 31, 1944 in Warsaw and sent to the women's concentration camp at Ravensbrück. From there, she was sent to the Neuengamme forced labor camp, where she was given prisoner number 7257 and had her valuables seized.