First two Galileo satellites on route to final positions

The first two Galileo satellites launched from French Guiana last month were on the right route moving to their final positions, French space agency CNES said Thursday. The first two Galileo satellites are "on their way" to "the precise position they should occupy in the Galileo constellation," the CNES said in a statement. The Russian-built launcher Soyuz lifted off the two satellites from French Guiana on Oct. 21, marking the first concrete step of Europe's Galileo satellite navigation system backed by the European Commission. After weeks of drift, the operations teams have started on Nov. 15 "positioning maneuvers to ensure the final altitude of the two from 23,222 kilometers to a better one of 5 meters nearer," the statement added. This pair of In-Orbit Validation satellites is the first members of the operational nucleus of Europe's full 30-satellite Galileo navigation constellation, a collaborative program of the European Space Agency and European Union. With cost over 5 billion euros (6.9 billion U.S. dollars), the Galileo programme is expected to finish full deployment by this decade's end, expecting to free Europe from reliance on America's GPS satellites. Another two Galileo satellites will be carried by Soyuz into space in 2012, according to Arianespace.