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Europe's New Ariane 6 Rocket to Launch June 15-July 31, 2024

FILE PHOTO: A worker of Ariane Group stands in front of a Ariane 6 rocket's Vulcain 2.1 engine, prior to the visit of French President Emmanuel Macron, in Vernon, France January 12, 2021. Christophe Ena/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A worker of Ariane Group stands in front of a Ariane 6 rocket's Vulcain 2.1 engine, prior to the visit of French President Emmanuel Macron, in Vernon, France January 12, 2021. Christophe Ena/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
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Europe's New Ariane 6 Rocket to Launch June 15-July 31, 2024

FILE PHOTO: A worker of Ariane Group stands in front of a Ariane 6 rocket's Vulcain 2.1 engine, prior to the visit of French President Emmanuel Macron, in Vernon, France January 12, 2021. Christophe Ena/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A worker of Ariane Group stands in front of a Ariane 6 rocket's Vulcain 2.1 engine, prior to the visit of French President Emmanuel Macron, in Vernon, France January 12, 2021. Christophe Ena/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket will stage an inaugural flight between June 15 and July 31 in 2024, the European Space Agency said on Thursday.
The keenly awaited window for the first test flight came after a test model of the new rocket passed a key long-firing engine test in French Guiana last week, Reuters reported.
ESA nations agreed in 2014 to develop Ariane 6 in response to growing competition in the commercial launch market but its arrival, originally due in 2020, has been repeatedly delayed.
"I am really happy to make this announcement today because it shows that we are on the good track to flight access to space for Europe," ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher told a news conference.
The maiden flight will carry some smaller satellites, including two from NASA, but since it is still considered a test flight, it will not carry "a major payload", ESA added.
The ESA will carry out a few additional tests before the launch to make sure the design is "fault tolerant".
The ESA said it planned a second flight by the end of 2024 and would ramp up further in 2025 to reach a target of 9-10 flights per year.
The launcher is being developed by ArianeGroup, a joint venture between Airbus and Safran, in order to better compete with US private launch provider SpaceX.
Its predecessor, Ariane 5, flew for the last time in July and the smaller Vega C remains grounded following a failure in December last year, leaving Europe without independent access to space. Russia blocked European use of its Soyuz rockets last year in response to Western sanctions over Ukraine.
Last week's test at the European spaceport in French Guiana involved igniting the core-stage Vulcain 2.1 engine and then running it for seven minutes, which is about the time it would take for the launcher to reach space.
Aschbacher said last month he hoped to be able to announce a launch window for an inaugural flight to be held in 2024, depending on the results of the engine test.

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'Dinosaur Highway' Tracks Dating Back 166 Million Years are Discovered in England

In this undated photo provided by the University of Birmingham on Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025, work underway as five extensive trackways that formed part of a "dinosaur highway" are uncovered, at Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. (University of Birmingham via AP)
In this undated photo provided by the University of Birmingham on Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025, work underway as five extensive trackways that formed part of a "dinosaur highway" are uncovered, at Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. (University of Birmingham via AP)
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'Dinosaur Highway' Tracks Dating Back 166 Million Years are Discovered in England

In this undated photo provided by the University of Birmingham on Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025, work underway as five extensive trackways that formed part of a "dinosaur highway" are uncovered, at Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. (University of Birmingham via AP)
In this undated photo provided by the University of Birmingham on Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025, work underway as five extensive trackways that formed part of a "dinosaur highway" are uncovered, at Dewars Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. (University of Birmingham via AP)

A worker digging up clay in a southern England limestone quarry noticed unusual bumps that led to the discovery of a “dinosaur highway” and nearly 200 tracks that date back 166 million years, researchers said Thursday.

The extraordinary find made after a team of more than 100 people excavated the Dewars Farm Quarry, in Oxfordshire, in June expands upon previous paleontology work in the area and offers greater insights into the Middle Jurassic period, researchers at the universities of Oxford and Birmingham said.

“These footprints offer an extraordinary window into the lives of dinosaurs, revealing details about their movements, interactions, and the tropical environment they inhabited,” said Kirsty Edgar, a micropaleontology professor at the University of Birmingham, The AP reported.

Four of the sets of tracks that make up the so-called highway show paths taken by gigantic, long-necked, herbivores called sauropods, thought to be Cetiosaurus, a dinosaur that grew to nearly 60 feet (18 meters) in length. A fifth set belonged to the Megalosaurus, a ferocious 9-meter predator that left a distinctive triple-claw print and was the first dinosaur to be scientifically named two centuries ago.

An area where the tracks cross raises questions about possible interactions between the carnivores and herbivores.

“Scientists have known about and been studying Megalosaurus for longer than any other dinosaur on Earth, and yet these recent discoveries prove there is still new evidence of these animals out there, waiting to be found," said Emma Nicholls, a vertebrate paleontologist at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History.

Nearly 30 years ago, 40 sets of footprints discovered in a limestone quarry in the area were considered one of the world's most scientifically important dinosaur track sites. But that area is mostly inaccessible now and there's limited photographic evidence because it predated the use of digital cameras and drones to record the findings.

The group that worked at the site this summer took more than 20,000 digital images and used drones to create 3-D models of the prints. The trove of documentation will aid future studies and could shed light on the size of the dinosaurs, how they walked and the speed at which they moved.

“The preservation is so detailed that we can see how the mud was deformed as the dinosaur’s feet squelched in and out," said Duncan Murdock, an earth scientist at the Oxford museum. "Along with other fossils like burrows, shells and plants we can bring to life the muddy lagoon environment the dinosaurs walked through.”

The findings will be shown at a new exhibit at the museum and also broadcast on the BBC's “Digging for Britain” program next week.