Russian Earth observing satellite delivered to orbit

A day after a rare last-minute abort by its Soyuz launcher, a sharp-eyed civilian-operated Russian Earth observation satellite blasted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Sunday on a five-year mission, giving Russia a fleet of three advanced digital imaging spacecraft in orbit. The Resurs P3 satellite launched at 1856 GMT (2:56 p.m. EDT) from the historic launch base in Kazakhstan. The satellite’s Soyuz booster steered north from Baikonur, and dropped its four first stage engines about two minutes after liftoff. A core engine — called the second stage — and a third stage propulsion system delivered the Resurs P3 satellite to a preliminary orbit about 9 minutes, 21 seconds into the flight, according to a statement by Roscosmos, the Russian space agency. More

(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 14)