spacecraft's dynamic behaviour and environment, as well as the mandatory core experiments regarding its reentry technologies. Additionally, the IXV will typically carry complementary passenger experiments which, while not having been directly necessary to its mission success, serve to increase the vehicle's return on investment; according to the ESA, in excess of 50 such proposals had been received from a mixture of European industries, research institutes and universities, many having benefits to future launcher programmes (such as potential additional methods for guidance, navigation, control, structural health monitoring, and thermal protection), space exploration, and scientific value. Throughout each mission, telemetry is broadcast to ground controllers to monitor the vehicle's progress; however, phenomenon such as the build-up of plasma around the spaceplane during its re-entry has been known to block radio signals. The IXV is the precursor of the next model named Space Rider, also developed under the Italian PRIDE programme for ESA. Flight Test During 2011, it was reported that the IXV was planned to conduct its maiden flight as early as 2013; however, the vehicle was later rescheduled to perform its first launch using the newly developed Vega launcher during late 2014. This initial launch window was ultimately missed due to unresolved range safety concerns. Following some delays, on 11 February 2015 the IXV was successfully launched into a suborbital trajectory by a Vega rocket on the VV04 mission. Having launched at 08:40am local time, the vehicle separated from the Vega launch vehicle at 333 km altitude and ascended to 412 km, after which it commenced a controlled descent towards beginning its reentry at 120 km altitude, travelling at a recorded speed of 7.5 km/s, identical to a typical re-entry path to be flown by low Earth orbit (LEO) spacecraft. Following re-entry, the IXV glided over the Pacific Ocean prior to the opening of its landing parachutes, which were deployed in order to slow down the craft's descent, having flown over 7300 km from the beginning of its reentry. The vehicle descended to the surface of the Pacific Ocean, where it was subsequently recovered by the Nos Aries ship; analysis of both the spacecraft itself and recorded mission data took place. Jean-Jacques Dordain, then-director general of the ESA, stated of the mission: "It couldn't have been better, but the mission itself is not yet over... it will move the frontiers of knowledge further back concerning aerodynamics, thermal issues, and guidance and