European Retrievable Carrier

EURECA (European Retrievable CArrier, as much as " European traceable Research Platform " ) was a manufactured by the prime contractor MBB ERNO in Bremen research satellite. He was suspended for the Space Shuttle mission STS -46 in 1992 and worked at an altitude of about 500 km. A year later he was captured by STS -57 again and returned to the earth. EURECA weighed 4491 kg, representing an electric power of 1.5 kW. The payload was 1 t and consisted of 71 experiments.

A special feature was the modular composite of fiberglass struts and ball joints structure, a variant developed by MBB ERNO reusable satellite platform SPAS.

While staying in orbit experiments for microgravity, solar observations, as well as material research has been conducted. In addition, was a wide-angle camera and a tool for observing high-energy X-rays on board. The RIT -10 ion thruster RITA MBB / EADS was first tested in space. In addition, EURECA presented a Ka-band connection to the experimental communications satellite Olympus ago.

Although the satellite was designed for at least five missions, EURECA completed only one mission.

EURECA is one of the few original spacecraft, which have been preserved in a museum. In 2000, the satellite arrived as a gift to the ESA Museum of Transport Switzerland to Lucerne, where he has since exhibited in the hall Aerospace.

EURECA when capturing