A 151-foot-tall (46-meter) Soyuz launcher climbed into space from French Guiana on Thursday with the Boeing-built SES 15 communications satellite bound for an operating position over the Americas in geostationary orbit.
The Soyuz ST-A rocket took off at 1154:53 GMT (7:54:53 a.m. EDT; 8:54:53 a.m. French Guiana time) from a purpose-built launch facility at the Guiana Space Center on the northern coast of South America.
It was the 17th time a Russian-made Soyuz rocket has flown from the jungle spaceport, and it marked the fifth Arianespace launch of the year.
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