Ariane family

Ariane 42P

The Ariane 4 was an expendable space launch system, developed by the Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES), the French space agency, for the European Space Agency (ESA). It was manufactured by ArianeGroup and marketed by Arianespace. Since its first flight on 15 June 1988 until the final flight on 15 February 2003, it attained 113 successful launches out of 116 total launches.

Flights flown15

Success rate93.3%14/15

Payload to LEO6,000kg

Maiden flight1990-11-20

Peak year19923 flights

Ariane 42P is built by Aérospatiale of France. Company background, funding, contracts and news for this operator are tracked on Space Index. It first flew on 20 November 1990 and last flew on 4 May 2002.

Flight record

15 records

93.3% success rate14 of 15 flown · 1 failed

1990peak 1992 · 3 flights2002

First flight1990-11-20

Latest flight2002-05-04

Failures1

Consecutive successes8

Fastest turnaround22d 23h

Payload

Per mission profile

Low Earth orbit	6,000kg
Geostationary transfer orbit	2,990kg

Vehicle

42P spec

Stages	2
Length	55.9m
Diameter	3.8m
Launch mass	323t
Liftoff thrust	3,944kN
Maiden flight	1990-11-20
Reusable	No

Pads used

1 pad

Ariane Launch Area 215

Orbits delivered

2 orbits

Geostationary Orbit13Low Earth Orbit2

Launch history

15 launches

Date	Mission	Pad	Orbit	Outcome
2002-05-04	Ariane 42P \| SPOT 5	Ariane Launch Area 2	Low Earth Orbit	Success
1999-09-04	Ariane 42P \| Mugunghwa 3	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1999-08-12	Ariane 42P \| Telkom 1	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1999-04-02	Ariane 42P \| Insat 2E	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1998-02-27	Ariane 42P \| Hot Bird 4	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1996-09-11	Ariane 42P \| Echostar II	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1996-04-20	Ariane 42P \| M-SAT 1	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1995-06-10	Ariane 42P \| DirecTV 3	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1994-12-01	Ariane 42P \| PAS 3	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Failure
1994-11-01	Ariane 42P \| Astra 1D	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1993-06-25	Ariane 42P \| Galaxy 4H	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1992-12-01	Ariane 42P \| Superbird A1	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1992-10-28	Ariane 42P \| Galaxy 7	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success
1992-08-10	Ariane 42P \| Topex-Poseidon, Kitsat 1 & S80/T	Ariane Launch Area 2	Low Earth Orbit	Success
1990-11-20	Ariane 42P \| Satcom C1 & GStar 4	Ariane Launch Area 2	Geostationary Orbit	Success

Specifications from Launch Library 2 by The Space Devs, launch records from Space Index. Derived figures are computed here; see sources and method.