A significant milestone in the development of the BepiColombo mission! This note was sent this morning by Elsa Montagnon, the Spacecraft Operations Manager for BepiColombo at ESOC – Ed.

We have AOS [acquisition of signal]!! Yesterday afternoon, telemetry signals from the BepiColombo flight model spacecraft were received at ESOC, the mission control centre, for the first time. The data were transmitted as a test during the installation of the NDIU (a box that simulates a ground station) in ESTEC, near where the flight model is located.

This labyrinth of power, data and propellant lines is found inside the Mercury Transfer Module, the powerful haulage vehicle tasked with transporting ESA’s BepiColombo mission on its 7.5-year journey to the innermost planet. This is the flight model, which was on public display at ESA's ESTEC Open Day, 2 October 2014. The two wrinkled-looking silver spheres are propellant tanks. Credit: ESA–A. Le Floc’h

This labyrinth of power, data and propellant lines is found inside the Mercury Transfer Module, the powerful haulage vehicle tasked with transporting ESA’s BepiColombo mission on its 7.5-year journey to the innermost planet. This is the flight model, which was on public display at ESA’s ESTEC Open Day, 2 October 2014. The two wrinkled-looking silver spheres are propellant tanks. Credit: ESA–A. Le Floc’h

As you can imagine, the Flight Control Team at ESOC are delighted about achieving this very concrete operational milestone, the first of many on our way to Mercury!

Kind regards
– Elsa