Live coverage: Ariane 5 rocket deploys satellites for Australia, India

The next pair of spacecraft to join Europe’s Galileo navigation system are positioned for liftoff late Thursday aboard a Soyuz rocket. These photos chronicle the preparation of the satellites for launch at the Guiana Space Center.

China led the world with 34 orbital launch attempts in 2019 — including two failures — followed by 22 flights from Russian-operated launch pads and 21 satellite delivery missions originating from U.S. spaceports, all of which were successful.

Fresh off the launch of its last four first-generation satellites, O3b Networks is in the early stages of selecting a builder and launch provider for a new series of spacecraft that will grow the company’s broadband communications capacity ten-fold, O3b’s chief executive said.