An Ariane 5 rocket roared from the European Spaceport in French Guiana on Friday, carrying two satellites into geostationary transfer orbits. The liftoff occurred at 2229 UTC (6:29 pm EDT), after a one day delay because of high-altitude winds. The satellites were released into their transfer orbits 30 minutes after launch.
The first satellite is the ASTRA 1L, which will join a dozen spacecraft in the SES ASTRA constellation. They provide television broadcast and data communications services to 109 million households in Europe.
The second satellite is the Galaxy 17 broadcast satellite, built by Thales Alenia Space, and launched for Intelsat. It became Intelsat’s 45th satellite launched aboard an Ariane rocket. Galaxy 17 will park above 74 degrees West above the equator, and provide broadcast services to North America.
This is the second Ariane 5 launch of the year; 4 more are planned.
Original Source: ESA News Release
In recent article, soil scientist John Grant discusses the ways in which we could harvest…
It's one of nature's topsy-turvy tricks that the deep interior of the Earth is as…
To terraform Mars, we will need to give it a protective magnetic field. Here's how…
The commercial space company SpinLaunch just conducted its first successful launch test from their facility…
Planets without plate tectonics are unlikely to be habitable. But currently, we've never seen the…
Even after 30 months in space, The Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 mission continues to successfully…