Topaze (Véhicule Expérimental 111 Topaze) is the designation of a French sounding rocket. The Topaze was developed by several French companies, notably Nord Aviation and Sud Aviation, and built by SEREB (a joint venture of Nord and Sud, now known as Aérospatiale) and was the first guidable French sounding rocket. It was part of the Pierres précieuses (fr.: gemstones) program, that included five prototypes Agathe, Topaze, Emeraude, Rubis and Saphir, leading up to the Diamant orbital rocket. The name indicates that it is a "Véhicule Expérimental" (Experimental Vehicle) with 1 stage, using solid propulsion (code 1), and guided (code 1). The Topaze was launched 14 times from the CIEES launch site in Hammaguir (Hammaguira Bacchus pad), Algeria, by ONERA.
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This article is an automated import of the Wikipedia article "Topaze (rocket)", available at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topaze_(rocket) . Text is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.