 Hipparcos satellite in the Large Solar Simulator, ESTEC, February 1988 | |
| Names | HIPPARCOS |
|---|---|
| Mission type | Astrometric observatory |
| Operator | ESA |
| COSPAR ID | 1989-062B |
| SATCAT no. | 20169 |
| Website | http://sci.esa.int/hipparcos/ |
| Mission duration | 2.5 years (planned) 4 years (achieved) |
| Spacecraft properties | |
| Spacecraft | HIPPARCOS |
| Manufacturer | Alenia Spazio Matra Marconi Space |
| Launch mass | 1,140 kg (2,510 lb) [1] |
| Dry mass | 635 kg (1,400 lb) |
| Payload mass | 210 kg (460 lb) |
| Power | 295 watts |
| Start of mission | |
| Launch date | 8 August 1989, 23:25:53 UTC |
| Rocket | Ariane 44LP H10 (V33) |
| Launch site | Centre Spatial Guyanais, Kourou, ELA-2 |
| Contractor | Arianespace |
| Entered service | August 1989 |
| End of mission | |
| Disposal | decommissioned |
| Deactivated | March 1999 |
| Orbital parameters | |
| Reference system | Geocentric orbit[2] |
| Regime | Geostationary transfer orbit Geostationary orbit (planned) |
| Perigee altitude | 500.3 km (310.9 mi) |
| Apogee altitude | 35,797.5 km (22,243.5 mi) |
| Inclination | 6.84° |
| Period | 636.9 minutes |
| Revolution no. | 17830 |
| Main telescope | |
| Type | Schmidt telescope |
| Diameter | 29 cm (11 in) |
| Focal length | 1.4 m (4 ft 7 in) |
| Wavelengths | visible light |
| Transponders | |
| Band | S-Band |
| Bandwidth | 2-23 kbit/s |
 Legacy ESA insignia for the Hipparcos mission | |
Hipparcos was a scientific satellite of the European Space Agency (ESA), launched in 1989 and operated until 1993. It was the first space experiment devoted to precision astrometry, the accurate measurement of the positions of celestial objects on the sky.[3] This permitted the first high-precision measurements of the intrinsic brightnesses proper motions, and parallaxes of stars, enabling better calculations of their distance and tangential velocity. When combined with radial velocity measurements from spectroscopy, astrophysicists were able to finally measure all six quantities needed to determine the motion of stars. The resulting Hipparcos Catalogue, a high-precision catalogue of more than 118,200 stars, was published in 1997. The lower-precision Tycho Catalogue of more than a million stars was published at the same time, while the enhanced Tycho-2 Catalogue of 2.5 million stars was published in 2000. Hipparcos' follow-up mission, Gaia, was launched in 2013.
The word "Hipparcos" is an acronym for HIgh Precision PARallax COllecting Satellite and also a reference to the ancient Greek astronomer Hipparchus of Nicaea, who is noted for applications of trigonometry to astronomy and his discovery of the precession of the equinoxes.
- ^ "The Hipparcos and Tycho Catalogues" (PDF). ESA. June 1997. Archived from the original (PDF) on 16 June 2015. Retrieved 16 June 2014.
- ^ "HIPPARCOS Satellite details 1989-062B NORAD 20169". N2YO. 16 June 2015. Retrieved 16 June 2015.
- ^ Perryman, Michael (2010). Khanna, Ramon (ed.). The Making of History's Greatest Star Map. Astronomers' Universe. Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag. Bibcode:2010mhgs.book.....P. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-11602-5. ISBN 9783642116018.