Overview
- A Vega‑C rocket operated by Avio is scheduled to lift off from Kourou in a narrow, instantaneous window late on Monday night into early Tuesday with payload fairing closure complete and both satellites encapsulated.
- The four‑stage mission will place the spacecraft into a sun‑synchronous orbit near 810–820 km and follow a roughly 116‑minute profile that deploys Sentinel‑3C first and FLEX about 56 minutes later.
- Sentinel‑3C, a 1,143 kg Copernicus satellite, carries radiometers, an imaging spectrometer and a radar altimeter to continue systematic monitoring of oceans, land, ice and atmosphere for operational weather and climate data into the 2030s.
- FLEX, a 397 kg Earth Explorer built by Thales Alenia Space, carries the FLORIS fluorescence imaging spectrometer to map faint photosynthetic fluorescence at about 300 m resolution and deliver new measurements of plant health, water use and carbon uptake.
- Vega‑C has recovered from a 2022 launch failure and completed several successful flights since then; for VV30 Avio is acting as prime contractor and the launch service operator and will perform a disposal burn after payload release to reduce debris risk.