German Austrian engineer and early advocate of the use of rockets for flight. Opel supported Valier's original rocket car tests as publicity. He dreamed of rocket-propelled transatlantic aircraft and later became Opel's competitor. Valier died in a careless accident in 1932, in his laboratory in Berlin, when working on a rocket combustion chamber. It exploded and a small metal fragment hit his pulmonary artery.

German Austrian engineer and early advocate of the use of rockets for flight. Opel supported Valier's original rocket car tests as publicity. He dreamed of rocket-propelled transatlantic aircraft and later became Opel's competitor. Valier died in a careless accident in 1932, in his laboratory in Berlin, when working on a rocket combustion chamber. It exploded and a small metal fragment hit his pulmonary artery.

Jupiter Missile Combat Training Launch 209, the first in a series of 12 CTL firings, was launched from AMR to a prescribed range of 1514 nm. The nose cone impacted .79 nm over and 2.19 nm right of the intended target. All missions were accomplished. The missile followed the intended flight path and performed within the accuracy requirements of the Jupiter system. IAF troops conducted the firing after LOD of MFSC completed the preliminary checkout. The primary mission of the test woe to evaluate the capabilities of launch crews under operational alert conditions.

The second Jupiter to be fired under the operational control of NATO troops in the Combat Training Launch program was fired from AMR at 1919 hours and 06 seconds EST to a range of 1,516 nm. The missile was originally scheduled for firing on 3 August but was postponed because of problems with the fuel probe in the fuel start tank and the micro-switch on the fuel pumping lever arm which controls the fuel flow rate. All missions assigned to the missile and to the NATO training launch crew were successfully accomplished.

The third NATO operational control Combat Training Launch was fired from AMR at 1737 hours and 24 seconds EST to a prescribed range of 1,516 nm. The missile was well constrained to the intended flight path and within accuracy requirements of the Jupiter system. The missile impacted in the target area and all missions assigned to this test were successfully accomplished.

The project for an indigenous Italian ballistic missile was begunby the Italian Navy. Officially it was called a 'technology program intented to develop high power solid-propellant boosters for civil and military applications'. The resulting missile was to be carried on submarines and major surface combatants.

Experimental commsat. SIRIO (Satellite Italiano Ricerca Industriale Orientata). Launch time 2350:00 GMT. Geographical longitude of geostationary orbit 15 deg W. SIRIO is a spin stabilized geostationary experimental communications satellite. Characteristics of satellite: Weight at launch 398 kg, in orbit 218 kg. Configuration - cylindrical, height 1.981m, diameter 1.433 m, nominal life two years. Positioned in geosynchronous orbit over the Atlantic Ocean at 15 deg W in 1977-1981; over the Atlantic Ocean 25 deg W in 1981-1983; over the Indian Ocean 65 deg E in 1983-1985 As of 4 September 2001 located at 86.65 deg E drifting at 0.265 deg E per day. As of 2007 Mar 11 located at 75.38E drifting at 0.003E degrees per day.

Experimental commsat; 13.2 deg E. ITALSAT is a body stabilized geostationary satellite and it is proposed to provide pre-operational domestic telecommunications services on the 20/30 GHz bands. Geographic longitude 13.2 deg E. Longitudinal tolerance +/- 0.1 deg. Positioned in geosynchronous orbit at 13 deg E in 1991-1999 As of 4 September 2001 located at 144.14 deg E drifting at 1.021 deg W per day. As of 2007 Mar 11 located at 86.26E drifting at 1.156W degrees per day.

The Temisat micro-satellite was a piggyback payload designed to collect and re-transmit environmental data from terrestrial sensors and was separated from Meteor-2-21 on the seventh transit of the flight. Temisat was registered by the Telespazio Italian partner in agreement with the Kaiser-Threde Company (Munich). Environmental measurements were acquired through ground sensors, collected, temporarily stored on the ground, and logged by an autonomous terminal until upload request is received from TEMISAT.Characteristics: (a) Mass 42 kg (b) Dimension 35 x 35 x 35 cm, (c) Electric power 62 W Max, (d) Attitude control : 2 magnetic coil, 1 Am**2, (e) On-board memories - 2 of 8.5 Mbytes each, (f) Lifetime 5 years. Drift of the ascending node of orbital plane: 0.8 deg/d westwards. Copassenger of METEOR 2 satellite.

Experimental satellite developed by the GAUSS (Gruppo di Astrodinamica dell' Universita degli Studi 'la Sapienza') in Roma. Unisat was financed by ASI and MURST (Ministero dell'Universtia e della Ricerca Scientifica e Tecnologica). It carried NiMH batteries, a magnetometer, and a payload consisting of a space debris sensor and a camera.

Sicral, (Sistema Italiana de Communicazione Riservente Allarmi) was a communications satellite for the Italian defense ministry's procurement division, the Segretariato Generale della Difesa's Direzione Nazionale degli Armamenti. Sicral was built by Alenia Aerospazio and derived from the Italsat series. Its mass was 2596 kg full, 1253 kg dry and it carried a liquid apogee engine. The 3.3 kW, 3.4 m x 4.9 m, triaxially-stabilized spacecraft carried a total of nine transponders in the SHF-, UHF-, and EHF-bands to enable secure communications after parking over 16.2 deg-E longitude. Positioned in geosynchronous orbit at 16 deg E in 2001 As of 26 August 2001 located at 16.27 deg E drifting at 0.004 deg W per day. As of 2007 Mar 9 located at 16.34E drifting at 0.018E degrees per day.

The PSLV-C8 launch vehicle flew for the first time in a light configuration with no strap-on motors and a Dual Launch Adapter. The Italian gamma-ray observatory satellite (Astrorivelatore Gamma ad Imagini Leggero) carried the GRID 0.3-200 MeV wide-field gamma ray camera and the Super-AGILE 15-45 keV detector hard X-ray detector.

Laser Relativity Satellite, a 390 kg, 0.38 m diameter tungsten sphere covered with 92 laser retroreflectors. Used to probe relativistic effects in the Earth's gravitational field. The satellite had the lowest ballistic coefficient of any satellite ever launched. First launch of the ESA/Italian Vega launch vehicle.

Technology satellite for the University of Rome. It carried a further eight tiny satellites within it, and one of those (PUCP-Sat) carried a further nested satellite, Pocket-PUCP. Most of the subsatellites were ejected from Unisat-5 between 08:10 and 08:25 GMT on November 21.

GAUSS SRi (Rome), 3U cubesat containing (and ejecting) two cylindrical 'Tubesats', each 0.75 kg, 0.09m dia 0.13m long. The tubesats were TANCREDO-1 from a school in Ubatuba, Brazil and OSNSAT from the Open Space Network of Mountain View, California. TuPOD ejected its two small Tubesats, on Jan 19.