Watch Ariane 5 launch with Star One D1 and JCSAT 15

A Russian Proton rocket blasted off from Kazakhstan on Friday on a critical launch aiming to complete deployment of a major multibillion-dollar global communications network for London-based Inmarsat. Liftoff occurred at 1144 GMT (7:44 a.m. EDT), but it will take more than 15 hours to put the satellite in the correct orbit.

The sixth in a series of environmental monitoring satellites jointly developed by China and Brazil successfully launched Dec. 20 on top of a Long March 4B rocket.

Follow the key events of the Falcon 9 rocket’s ascent to orbit 60 satellites for SpaceX’s Starlink broadband network.