successful launch of the James Webb telescope aboard Ariane 5

It is a truly special Christmas for many scientists who have been eagerly awaiting this moment. The largest space telescope ever built, James Webb, was launched into space thanks to the Ariane 5 rocket on Saturday, December 25. The event took place from Kourou, in French Guiana, and represents the fruit of nearly thirty years of international collaboration. In the control room, an exceptional fact, Europeans rub shoulders with Americans. Everyone is relieved when the space telescope is released into orbit. “There was a wait, it was very moving”, explains Pierre Ferruit, from the European Space Agency (ESA).

The final orbit of the James Webb will be 1.5 million kilometers from Earth, four times farther than the Moon. Thanks to its infrared technology, it will be able to track down the first galaxies, black holes or signs of life around exoplanets. “We mainly want to observe the most distant galaxies in the universe, those formed after the Big Bang”, says Mark McCaughrean, Scientific Advisor at ESA. The deployment of the James Webb will last approximately thirty days, during which scientists “will still bite their fingers a lot“, says the chief of the sciences direction of the ESA. The telescope should send its first images within six months.