2011 'year of rockets' for Europe (BBC)

[eppur_se_muova]

By Jonathan Amos
Science correspondent, BBC News, Paris

Twenty-eleven will be the "year of launchers", says European Space Agency director-general Jean-Jacques Dordain.

Europe expects to have three different rockets operating from its French Guiana spaceport in the coming months.

The workhorse Ariane 5 will be joined by the Russian Soyuz vehicle and a new small launcher called Vega.

At his annual Paris press conference to preview the year ahead, Mr Dordain said this represented a major change in the way Esa conducted its space activities.

And he told the BBC everyone might be surprised at how complex an undertaking this would be.
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more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12197109

[Ghost Dog]

1. Aha. So Europe's Galileo satellite-navigation system is being launched by Soyuz

from French Guiana. It works out cheaper, I guess, even including the cost of the completely new launch facility, and is proven to be very reliable.

Notice that Arianespace is said by Esa's director-general to be more important as a "guarantee of (European) access to space" than as a simple commercial venture.