In 1995, the German Space Agency DARA selected the CHAllenging Minisatellite Payload (CHAMP) mission for development under a special support programme for the space industry in the new states of the unified Germany, with the Principal Investigator and his home institution GFZ Potsdam being ultimately responsible for the success of all mission phases. After three years of spacecraft manufactur- ing and testing, the satellite was injected successfully into its final, near circular, almost polar and low altitude (450 km) orbit from the cosmodrome Plesetsk in Russia on July 15, 2000. After a nine...