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An Ariane 5 heavy lifter rocket will rise Saturday, Dec. 20, from the European spaceport in French Guiana, South America, to orbit two satellites, Arianespace announced. That Ariane 5 will loft the Hot Bird and W2M satellites. Hot Bird, which will serve the European Eutelsat telecommunications firm, was installed on the Ariane 5 SYLDA satellite...

A Proton Breeze M rocket rose from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to orbit a Ciel 2 satellite, International Launch Services (ILS) announced. The bird was launched for the Ciel Satellite Group of Canada. That Proton carried the 5 1/2-ton satellite for 9 hours and 12 minutes, releasing it into geosynchronous transfer orbit. Ciel 2 is...

The launch of an Ariane 5 rocket will be postponed, Arianespace announced. Originally set for Wednesday, the launch has been rescheduled for Dec. 20. The delay was caused by unspecified "logistics difficulties in French Guiana," South America, where the European space center is located.

While the satellite sector generally remains in good health, a financial crisis that has cast a huge shadow over the globe also threatens the necessary funding that many companies will need as they look to expand their operations and capitalize on new technology and initiatives. There are warning signs already present. WorldSpace, filed for Chapter...

An Ariane 5 heavy lifter will boost the Hot Bird 9 and W2M satellites to orbit for European operator Eutelsat, Arianespace announced. The two communications satellites will be launched from the space center at Kourou, French Guiana, South America. Liftoff is set for 4:35 p.m. to 5:45 p.m. ET, which will be a nighttime launch...

Sea Launch will perform five launch operations for Intelsat, the sea-going launch platform company announced. The firms signed a multiple launch services contract for five missions on the Sea Launch system, scheduled for late 2010 through 2012. Sea Launch has performed eight successful missions for Intelsat so far, , most recently launching the Galaxy 19...

[Satellite News 11-24-08] Space Exploration Technology Corp.’s (SpaceX) Hawthorne, Calif. facility is a remodeled Boeing hangar where engines for the 747 aircraft were once manufactured. The only elements left from the Boeing days are the track-mounted cranes dangling from the ceilings, but those cranes work on a different kind of engine now.     SpaceX Director...

United Launch Alliance plans to lay off hundreds of workers next year, the Denver Business Journal reported. ULA is a joint venture of The Boeing Co. [BA] and Lockheed Martin Corp. [LMT]. Cuts will begin with an initial 350 hitting unemployment lines in February, spread across many business locations. ULA offers the Boeing Delta and...

Sea Launch took delivery of the SICRAL 1B communications satellite at the payload processing facility at the Sea Launch home port in the Port of Long Beach. With additional arrivals this month of associated hardware and personnel, Sea Launch is prepared to boost the satellite to space in January. Sea Launch will be inserting the...

NASA’s newest high-performance rocket engine, the J-2X, successfully completed its critical design review, NASA announced. The engine passed the milestone at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. That J-2X engine was developed for NASA by Pratt and Whitney Rocketdyne, a unit of United Technologies Corp. [UTX]. The engine is the first element of the...