BepiColombo MPO in ESTEC cleanroom
Date: 05 August 2011
Satellite: BepiColombo Mercury Planetary Orbiter
Copyright: ESA
The BepiColombo Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) Structural and Thermal Model (STM), mounted on its ground handling trolley in a cleanroom at ESA's European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in Noordwijk, the Netherlands. The inner, low-temperature thermal blankets (silver) are exposed pending installation of the high-temperature outer blankets.
The thermal test harness, which connects the ~550 thermocouples used to monitor temperatures in and on the MPO to the thermal data handling system, can be seen descending from the upper left of the orbiter.
Last Update: 1 September 2019
