Cora

Cora was an experimental rocket used to test the second and third stages of the Europa launch vehicle.

Launchings of the test vehicle were carried out by ELDO (European Launcher Development Organization) — which later merged with the European Space Research Organisation to form the European Space Agency.

The Cora 1 version used only the French Coralie stage, while the Cora 2 version added the German Astris stage. The Italian Europa nose fairing was also tested. For these tests the Coralie exit nozzle was shortened to allow sea-level operation and four fins were added for stability.

In the event, only the Cora 1 version was tested, and this failed on two out of three attempts. It was unfortunate that the test series could not be completely carried out, since later tests of the all-up Europa booster had a string of failures due to upper-stage problems, dooming the entire program.