The fairing on any launcher is the bodywork that protects the launchers payload, in our case ATV Georges Lemaître. Look at the picture of an Ariane-5 booster awaiting its ATV-5 and other stages: without the fairing something doesn’t quite look right.

Just like a tuned car, the fairing offers space for stickers and decals to show viewers what is inside this launcher.

We have the pleasure to show you in advance the fairing for ATV-5. Featuring the logos of ESA (celebrating 50 years of space this year), the ATV-5 mission and Arianespace as would be expected, the design also includes the logo of a city in France.

The City of Salon de Provence holds this year’s presidency of the Community of Ariane Cities, an association of European cities and industries active in space transportation. The city of Salon de Provence, the French Airforce Academy and their local partners are holding a comprehensive programme of public outreach and education events throughout the year that include a “City-launcher partnership”. In addition to showing the ATV-5 live launch broadcast with the city’s coat of arms flying on the Ariane 5 rocket, Salon de Provence will offer a public Space Night on 27 September.

More details on the city-launcher partnership are available here: https://www.ariane-cities.com/en/programmes/parrainage.htm