50th Anniversay of the Canaries Space Centre

Isdefe’s CEO, Francisco Quereda, led the delegation that, on behalf of our company, attended the events organised by the National Institute of Aerospace Technology (INTA) to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Canaries Space Centre in San Bartolomé de Tirajana, Gran Canaria on 24 and 25 October.

Isdefe provides engineering and consulting services by operating and maintaining the Space Centre, which offers its services to international space agencies like ESA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and to satellite operators like EUMESAT, Hispasat and Hisdesat.

The Canaries Space Centre is a Spanish satellite tracking centre under the authority of the National Institute of Aerospace Technology.

This Centre, which was originally located next to the Maspalomas lighthouse, is the oldest space centre in Spain.

Part of the network set up by NASA for its Mercury Project in the early 1960s, throughout its history the Canaries Space Centre has taken part in projects as iconic as the Apollo Project.

Owned by INTA, from the late 70s to the early 80s, the Centre began providing services to the European Space Agency and other space agencies and international projects, like the Cospas-Sarsat satellite rescue programme, hosting the ground station and mission control centre for the airspace over Spain and western Africa.

The Canaries Space Centre currently runs public services for the Spanish government, and it also competes in the international market for ground-based space services, an area in which it is internationally renowned.