Science

ROBUSTA-3A (MEDITERRANEE)

French University CubeSat (Ariane 6 Maiden Flight Payload) · University of Montpellier (CSUM) / CNES

Also called 'Méditerranée,' this shoebox-sized CubeSat was the sole French university payload aboard Ariane 6's historic maiden flight on July 9, 2024. Built by roughly 300 students over more than a decade at the University of Montpellier's Space Center, ROBUSTA-3A watches GNSS signals from Europe's own Galileo constellation reflecting off the Mediterranean Sea's surface, measuring atmospheric water vapor accumulation to help Météo-France better predict the violent 'Cévenol episodes' — sudden, catastrophic Mediterranean rainstorms that have caused deadly flash floods across southern France. As a secondary mission, it also tests how a French-made computer memory chip — one that had already flown to the Moon aboard India's Chandrayaan-3 lander — holds up against the radiation of low Earth orbit.