For the fifth time in four years, a massive U.S. Navy satellite will launch atop an Atlas 5 rocket on Friday to finish the military’s new $7.7 billion mobile communications framework 22,300 miles in space.
This is the ascent timeline to be followed by the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket in launching the Mobile User Objective System satellite No. 5 on Friday at 10:30 a.m. EDT (1430 GMT).
The Ariane 5 rocket’s weekend launch from French Guiana set a weight record and produced stunning imagery as the powerful 180-foot-tall booster soared into space backdropped by the colorful orange hues of sunset on the edge of the Amazon jungle.
A Soyuz spacecraft carrying a three-man crew parachuted to the flat grasslands of Kazakhstan on Saturday, returning home from the International Space Station with cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, NASA astronaut Tim Kopra and British flight engineer Tim Peake.
Two U.S.-built communications satellites for Dish Network television subscribers and Indonesian banking customers fired into orbit from French Guiana aboard an Ariane 5 rocket Saturday, setting the record for the European launcher’s heaviest commercial payload.
A Russian cosmonaut, a NASA astronaut and a British flier strapped into a Soyuz spacecraft, undocked from International Space Station and plunged back to Earth Saturday, safely landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan to close out a 186-day mission.
An Ariane 5 rocket is counting down to a second launch attempt Saturday to carry two communications satellites into space for DISH Network and Indonesian banking customers, taking the heaviest payload ever launched into geostationary transfer orbit.
Veteran Soyuz commander Yuri Malenchenko, outgoing space station skipper Tim Kopra and British astronaut Tim Peake departed the International Space Station early Saturday aboard the Soyuz TMA-19M capsule and landed in Kazakhstan at 0915 GMT (5:15 a.m. EDT).
Three space station crew members made final preparations Friday for undocking and landing in Kazakhstan early Saturday to close out a 186-day stay in orbit.
A European Ariane 5 rocket will propel two communications satellites from a standstill to a speed of nearly 21,000 mph in 25 minutes during a launch Friday from French Guiana.