Heavy-lifting Ariane 5 delivers for three customers

An Ariane 5 rocket fired its clean-burning hydrogen-fueled main engine, passed an automated check of dozens of health parameters, and lit two tube-shaped solid rocket boosters to blast away from its launch pad in the Amazon jungle Thursday with two communications satellites to serve the Middle East, North Africa and India. Filled with cryogenic propellant, the 1.7-million-pound launcher lifted off at 2030 GMT (4:30 p.m. EDT) from the ELA-3 launch pad at the Guiana Space Center, a sprawling European-run facility on the northern coast of South America near the town of Kourou, French Guiana. More

(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Aug 30)