Universe Today
Practice your French counting skills and enjoy a beautiful night launch all in one fell swoop! An Ariane 5 rocket launched last night (May 15 at 22:13 GMT) from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana, sending two telecommunications satellites to space. The satellites, JCSAT-13 and Vinasat-2, were successfully and accurately injected into their transfer orbits about 26 minutes and 36 minutes after liftoff, respectively. This was the 62nd Ariane 5 launch, and the second this year. In March, an Ariane 5 rocket sent the ATV-3 "Edoardo Amaldi" to the International Space Station.
Beautiful Night Launch for Ariane 5
By Nancy Atkinson - May 16, 2012 at 8:10 PM UTC | uncategorized
Nancy Atkinson
Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.
Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.
Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com