Ariane 4

The figures quoted here are the 44L, the heaviest of the six configurations: ESA gives up to 58.72 metres and a 3.8 metre body across the whole family, and the 44L carried 7,000 kilograms to low orbit. The thrust needs a warning label. No agency page reachable today states a liftoff figure for any Ariane 4, so the 6,042 kilonewtons here is the published stage and booster numbers added up, and those look vacuum-rated, which would make the true sea level figure meaningfully lower. Treat it as an upper bound rather than a specification.

Modularity was the product. One core, six configurations from 240 to 470 tonnes on the pad, with solid or liquid strap-ons bolted on in pairs. A customer bought only as much rocket as the satellite needed, which is a mundane commercial idea that mattered more than any number on the performance sheet.

It ran on nitrogen tetroxide and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine, which are toxic, corrosive and thoroughly mediocre performers. They are also storable, so a fuelled rocket can sit and wait. For an operator selling launch slots rather than chasing records, being able to hold on the pad and go when the customer is ready beats a better exhaust velocity every time.

The record is 113 successes from 116 flights, 97.4 percent, with a run of 74 consecutive successes and 728 powered stages built and flown. At its peak it held about half the world commercial satellite launch market. Timing helped: after Challenger, American commercial payloads were pushed off the Shuttle and the expendable fleet was tangled up in government work, and Ariane 4 was sitting in Kourou taking bookings.

It was retired in February 2003 while still working, because Arianespace could not sell two vehicles into the same market and Ariane 5 needed the customers. That is the correct commercial decision, and it is also why a rocket at the top of its form was shut down rather than beaten.