spacetoday.net: Proton returns to flight with Inmarsat launch

Proton returns to flight with Inmarsat launch

Posted: Sat, Aug 29, 2015, 11:21 AM ET (1521 GMT)
Proton M launch of Inmarsat-5F3 (Roscosmos)

In its first launch since a failed mission in May, a Proton rocket successfully launched a communications satellite for Inmarsat on Friday. The Proton M lifted off form the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 7:44 am EDT (1144 GMT, 5:44 pm local time) Friday carrying the Inmarsat-5 F3 satellite. The rocket's Breeze M upper stage released the satellite into a supersynchronous transfer orbit fifteen and a half hours later. The 6,070-kilogram spacecraft, built by Boeing for London-based Inmarsat, will join two others already in orbit for the company's Global Xpress broadband communications system. The launch was the first Proton mission since a launch in mid-May that suffered a failure in its third stage, resulting in the loss of a Mexican communications satellite.