Stats: Delta 4 history and backlog (updated March 30)

The United Launch Alliance Delta 4 rocket, standing 217 feet tall and weighing 900,000 pounds, unleashes 1.8 million pounds of thrust from its main engine and four side-mounted boosters at 6:53 p.m. EST (2353 GMT) Wednesday to launch the eighth Wideband Global SATCOM satellite for U.S. military communications.

NASA, United Launch Alliance and Air Force officials hold the pre-launch news conference for the Delta 2 rocket with the agency’s SMAP environmental satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base on Jan. 27.

Investigators probing the sudden failure of the Boeing-built Intelsat 29e geostationary relay station in April have concluded an electrostatic discharge, aggravated by a harness flaw on the spacecraft, or a micrometeoroid strike prematurely ended the satellite’s mission, resulting in a $382 million hit to Intelsat’s quarterly financial report.