A link between Sky and Earth

Initiated in the late 1970s with the aim of securing Europe's access to space—and thus its independence—the Ariane program encompasses the construction of six rockets, including Ariane 5, a full-scale replica of which is on display at the Cité de l'Espace in Toulouse (Occitanie region, France).

Between June 4, 1996 (the date of its inaugural launch) and July 5, 2023 (the date of its last launch), the Ariane 5 rocket will have placed more than a hundred satellites into geostationary orbit, launched space probes toward objects in the Solar System, and placed various heavy payloads into low orbit.

For more than 25 years, it has been a true link between Heaven and Earth for Europeans.

This PhotoGraphism, created by applying image processing algorithms to a photograph of the Ariane 5 rocket taken from the gardens of the Cité de l'Espace, is intended as a tribute to the many services rendered by this space program—particularly in the scientific field, with the launch of the XMM-Newton, Planck and Herschel satellites, the James Webb Space Telescope, and the Rosetta, Bepi-Colombo and JUICE probes towards comet Chury (67P / Churyumov-Gerasimenko), the planet Mercury and the Jupiter system. These are all space missions whose names have remained in our memory and whose results have revolutionized our knowledge of the objects in the Universe.