Live coverage: Two satellites lift off aboard Ariane 5

Running more than six weeks late after social unrest in French Guiana forced the closure of Europe’s launch base there, a commercial Ariane 5 rocket took off Thursday just after sunset with a pair of communications satellites manufactured in France for owners in Brazil and South Korea.

OneWeb officials Tuesday unveiled plans for a factory just outside the gates of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida that will churn out up to 15 satellites per week to populate low Earth orbit and beam broadband Internet signals worldwide.

Soaring into orbit in a rare middle-of-the-night launch from French Guiana, an Ariane 5 rocket took off at 0520 GMT (12:20 a.m. EST) Wednesday with a Eutelsat communications satellite to boost television capacity ahead of the Rio Olympics.