In the 1960s, the Netherlands kept missing out on assignments in the European space program because they lacked experience. So to gain experience, the Dutch decided to build a satellite all by themselves. Fokker and Philips took care of the construction. When that first Astronomical Dutch Satellite, ANS, was launched in 1974, it was a generation and a half ahead of its contemporaries. ANS was 100% digital, a piece of Dutch ingenuity that even NASA was stunned about. After an exciting launch, in which the rocket caused problems, ANS began to study the universe with its special telescopes. ANS discovered interesting and new things in the X-ray and UV radiation in the universe, thus reaffirming the Netherlands as a top 3 country in the astronomical world. The technology in the satellite also ensured that the Netherlands could fully participate in the ESA and that some of that Dutch ingenuity can now be found in almost all European spacecraft. The documentary tells the adventure of ANS on the basis of beautiful archive images and the stories of the people who made it.
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