ERS 5 was a 31-cm-diameter balloon satellite. It was one of three spacecraft simultaneously placed into orbit by a single launch vehicle. The spacecraft carried only one experiment on board, a solar cell damage experiment. However, the satellite was also designed to investigate the effects of the solar radiation pressure on orbital characteristics (i.e. eccentricity and period) for a negligible atmospheric drag situation. The spacecraft returned solar cell damage data for the first 92 days of orbit. As of December 1972, the satellite was still in orbit, but was no longer capable of transmission. This satellite had the nonofficial name of DASH 1, which stands for Density And Scale Height.