Satellite preparation

The Guiana Space Centre provides Ariane customers with the necessary facilities and services for preparing and launching their satellites including use of the 'satellite preparation facility' (EPCU).

To house Ariane 5 and its voluminous payloads, the CSG constructed a new building, the S5. Commissioned in April 2001 for the Envisat campaign, the S5 has doubled the centre’s satellite integration capability (it can now take 4 satellites at a time).
The S5 consists of three large clean-rooms linked by corridors, in which satellites may be kept and worked on from their arrival until their transfer to the final assembly building (BAF).

• S5C: this first building, with a surface area of 700 m2, is used for any integration work which is not considered to be dangerous. It has a 30-tonne rolling bridge and a 300-m2 entrance airlock (the door is 20 m wide).
• S5B: this second building, with a surface area of 300 m2, is used for loading propellant (up to 10 tonnes).
• S5A: this third building, with a surface area of 400 m2, is used for loading small satellites with propellant (i.e. satellites no greater than 4 tonnes ).

The different clean-rooms are connected together by 12 m high airlocks with a surface area of 225 m2. In addition, the S5 has 1,000 m2 of office space.

Another wing of the S5E building offers specific facilities for fuelmen enabling them to work more efficiently and carefully. It is used for :

• fuelmen to change in, for them to try on protective suits and train with them
• for maintaining equipment

The building offers radio communications through the S5C safety consoles (the S5C building is for preparing operations which are not considered dangerous) so that personnel know when to come and fetch fuelmen from the changing rooms and take them to the decontamination room (and vice versa).

Until 2002, the satellite preparation facility (EPCU) consisted of several buildings divided into two zones, one in the Technical Centre and the other in the north zone.

• EPCU at the Technical Centre: this zone, consisting of the S1A and S1B buildings, was used for all preparation operations for satellites such as mechanical, electrical, pneumatic and radio-electrical tests (operations which are not considered to be dangerous). At the end of the assembly operations and tests, the satellites were moved to the north zone, close to the Ariane 2 launch complex.
• EPCU in the north zone: the S2, S3 and S4 buildings, which are close to the preparation zone for the Ariane 2 launch complex, were used for final preparation of satellites, for operations considered to be dangerous, such as fuelling with propellant or balancing and encapsulating satellites for launch.
  

For further information, consult the specific file on Satellite Preparation