Venus Express

摘要

The European Space Agency (ESA) has turned its attention to our neighbouring planet, and the agency's Venus Express [due for launch as this issue of Spaceflight went to press] will study our sister planet in unprecedented detail upon arrival in April 2006. With recent spacecraft to Mars (Mars Express -2002), around Earth (Envisat - 2002) and a planned mission to the planet Mercury (BepiColombo - 2012), ESA is currently the only space agency with missions to each planet of the inner solar System.