European Ariane rocket successfully launches two telecomms satellites

PARIS (AFP) Apr 10, 2003
A European Space Agency Ariane 5 rocket successfully placed into orbit two telecommunications satellites late Wednesday, minutes after the craft was launched for the first time since a disastrous failure in December cast a shadow over its reliability, officials at the Arianespace company said.

The Ariane 5 took off from Europe's space base at Kourou, in French Guiana, at 7:52 pm local time (2252 GMT) Wednesday, the officials at Arianespace headquarters near Paris said.

Thirty-one minutes later, the launcher successfully placed into geostationary orbit the 2.95-tonne INSAT 3A satellite for the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO),

A further seven minutes later, it launched the 1.76-tonne Galaxy XII for the US telecoms operator PanAmSat.

It was the first launch of an Ariane 5 since December 12, when a beefed-up version of the rocket, an Ariane 5-ECA, suddenly veered off course on its maiden flight. Mission controllers had to blow up the launcher along with two satellites.

The failure, which was reckoned to have cost half a billion dollars, was a major setback for Europe's commercial satellite launch industry.

The latest launch was initially scheduled for Tuesday, but was postponed only hours before takeoff.

An ISRO spokesman said the organisation had requested the postponement after it reported an anomaly in the satellite.

Arianespace is locked in a fierce battle with US rivals for the satellite launch market, a business that has been badly hit by the downturn in the telecommunications business.

The company now depends totally on the Ariane 5, whose standard version has a 5.9-tonne launch capacity. The smaller Ariane 4, a workhorse of space with an excellent record for reliability, was phased out of service after its last launch on February 15.

Arianespace posted an operating loss last year of between 50 and 60 million euros (dollars) last year, its chief operating officer, Jean-Yves Le Gall, said in February.

The INSAT-3A was originally scheduled to be launched in mid-February but it was delayed after the December 12 incident.

The satellite, the third in INSAT 3 series, was built and designed by ISRO. It will be used for telecommunications, television broadcasting, meteorology and satellite-aided search and rescue services.

The Galaxy-XII, made by Orbital Sciences, is designed to provide telecommunication services for 15 years across the United States, including Alaska and Hawaii.

SPACE.WIRE