Imagery from Friday’s fiery Proton rocket launch

Turkey’s newest communications satellite soared into space from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Friday, and these spectacular images show the middle-of-the-night liftoff of the spacecraft’s Russian Proton rocket booster before it disappeared into low clouds.

The 191-foot-tall rocket launched at 2040:11 GMT (4:40:11 p.m. EDT) Friday, lifting the 5.4-ton Turksat 4B satellite into orbit before deploying the craft thousands of miles above Earth nine hours later.

The liftoff occurred at 2:40 a.m. local time Saturday at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

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Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
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Photo credit: Roscosmos
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Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
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Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos
Photo credit: Roscosmos

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