Live coverage of the countdown and launch of a Proton rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan with the Eutelsat 5 West B television broadcasting satellite and the first Mission Extension Vehicle satellite servicing spacecraft. Text updates will appear automatically below; there is no need to reload the page. Follow us on Twitter.
Mission Reports
Arianespace targets early 2021 for Vega return-to-flight
Presenting the results of an inquiry into a European Vega rocket failure last month, officials said Friday that misleading instructions and inadequate preflight checks caused teams to overlook wrongly-installed cables on the launcher’s upper stage steering system. Arianespace aims to resume Vega launches before the end of March.
Falcon 9
Ground sensor reading scrubs Falcon 9 launch with Starlink satellites
An unexpected reading from a ground sensor prompted SpaceX to scrub the planned launch of a Falcon 9 rocket Thursday with 60 more Starlink broadband satellites. It was the second last-minute abort of a rocket launch on Florida’s Space Coast in less than 10 hours, following a hold Wednesday night just before engines ignited on a United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket.
