This Cluster II spacecraft, FM7 (Samba), was launched together with FM6 (Salsa) by a
Soyuz-Fregat rocket from Baikonur. The four similar spacecraft of the Cluster II mission are part
of ESA's and NASA's Solar-Terrestrial Science Program (STSP). The current Cluster II mission is a
near-replica of the original four-spacecraft mission lost at launch in 1996. (NSSDC will carry the
name "Cluster96" in its information files to designate the unsuccessful 1996 four-spacecraft Ariane
5 launch.) The purpose of the Cluster II mission is to study small-scale structures in three
dimensions in the Earth's plasma environment, such as those involved in the interaction between
the solar wind and the magnetospheric plasma, in global magnetotail dynamics, in cross-tail
currents, and in the formation and dynamics of the neutral line and of plasmoids.

The four Cluster II spacecraft will orbit in a tetrahedral formation in near-polar orbits of nominally
4 x 19.6 Earth radii, with period about 57 hours, and inclination about 90.7 degrees.. Relative distances
between the spacecraft will be adjusted in the course of the mission, depending on the spatial scales of
the structures to be studied, varying from a few hundred km to a few Earth radii. The tetrahedral formation
is essential for making three-dimensional measurements and for determining the curl of vectorial quantities
such as the magnetic field.

The orbits of all four spacecraft will be frequently maneuvered so as to achieve the targeted investigations.

Each spacecraft will be spin-stabilized, normally at around 15 rpm, and will be cylindrical in shape,
with a 2.9-m diameter and 1.3-m length. It will have two rigid 5-m radial experiment booms, four 50-m
experiment wire booms, and two axial telecommunications antenna booms. Telemetry downlink bit rate will
be 2 to 262 kbit/s.

Each spacecraft will have AC and DC magnetometers, an electric fields and waves sensor, an electron
emitter/detector, an electron density sounder, electron and ion plasma analysers, an energetic particle
detector, an ion emitter, and a data processing unit.

Cluster operations will be performed by ESOC in Darmstadt, Germany, with support from NASA's Deep Space Network.
Cluster is also an IACG mission. The scientific data are distributed by ESOC using CD-ROM as a medium
to the Principal Investigators, Co-Investigators and the network of eight national data centres (6 in
Europe, 1 in USA and 1 in China) that form the Cluster Science Data System (CSDS). There are approximately
80 recipients world-wide. Science operations are carried out by the Joint Science Operations Centre,
co-located with the UK data centre at RAL, Didcot. A wide scientific community will have differing rights of
access to the Cluster data. Scientists wishing to access Cluster data should contact their national Data Centres.

ESA SP-1159, Paris, March 1993 is entitled "Cluster: Mission, Payload and Supporting Activities" Edited by W. R. Burke.
European Space Agency, ESA SP-1159, 1993.ISBN: 92-9092-073-4.