Posted: Sat, Jun 7, 2003, 10:29 AM ET (1429 GMT)
A Proton rocket successfully launched a commercial communications satellite early Saturday. The Proton K lifted off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 6:15 pm EDT Friday (2215 GMT; 4:15 am Saturday local time). Its payload, the AMC-9 communications satellite for SES Americom, separated from the Breeze M upper stage 8 hours and 55 minutes after liftoff. AMC-9, a 4100-kg Spacebus 3000B3 model built by Alcatel, has 24 C-band and 24 Ku-band transponders and will provide telecommunications services for North and Central America from its eventual position in GEO at 85 degrees west. The launch is the second this year for the Proton, after a military launch in April, and the 300th in the history of the Proton, dating back to the 1960s.
