An Atlas V rocket lifted off Tuesday evening (Oct. 4) from Florida’s Space Coast, carrying two commercial communications satellites into orbit.
The Atlas V, topped off with the twin spacecraft SES-20 and SES-21, launched Tuesday at 5:36 pm EDT (2136 GMT) from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
The 196-foot-tall (60-meter) rocket hit all its marks early. It launched its three solid rockets about 2 minutes after liftoff as planned, for example, and discarded the payload fairing, which protected the two satellites during launch, about 1.5 minutes later. And the two Atlas V stages separated at about T+4.5 minutes.
Related: The history of rockets
Let’s relive the takeoff! #AtlasV #SES20 #SES21@SES_Satellites pic.twitter.com/uDh70XTCad October 4, 2022
See more
But much work remains to be done, because the rocket’s Centaur upper stage still needs to be powered toward the deployment destinations for SES-20 and SES-21: near-circular, near-geosynchronous orbits above Earth.
If all goes according to plan, SES-20 will deploy about 5 hours and 40 minutes after liftoff, with SES-21 following suit approximately 40 minutes later. The two spacecraft will then use their onboard propulsion systems to circularize their orbits, which will send them zooming around Earth about 22,300 miles (35,900 kilometers) above the equator, according to a ULA mission description (opens in a new tab).
Once the satellites are established in these orbits and have passed a check-out period, SES-20 and SES-21 can begin to do what they were built for: provide broadcast television service to the United States for Luxembourg telecommunications company SES.
“Built by Boeing with thousands of narrow, steerable beams and the ability to isolate sources of interference, the two spacecraft give SES and future customers the ability to extend, extend or even change the coverage area and a satellite’s lifetime mission,” ULA representatives wrote. in the mission description.
“Proven hardware together with next-generation technology created an affordable and lightweight spacecraft, which made it possible to launch two satellites on a single rocket,” they added.
The Atlas V launch is part of a busy week of spaceflight. For example, SpaceX plans to launch the Crew-5 astronaut mission for NASA and another batch of the company’s Starlink Internet satellites on two separate missions on Wednesday (Oct. 5), as well as two telecommunications satellites for the company Intelsat on Thursday (6 of October).
There are also three missions available for Thursday (October 6), including one rocket laboratory launch that will send into orbit a satellite built by the energy and technology firm General Atomics.
Editor’s note: This story was updated at 6:15 p.m. EDT on October 4 with news of a successful liftoff.
Mike Wall is the author of “Over there (opens in new tab)” (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a book about the search for alien life. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall (opens in a new tab). follow us on twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in a new tab) or enabled Facebook (opens in a new tab).