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Russia to launch Proton-M carrier rocket with US communications satellite

The EchoStar-21 is designed to provide mobile communications on the European territory

© Sergei Savostianov/TASS

MOSCOW, May 30. /TASS/. The launch of a Proton-M carrier rocket with an EchoStar-21 satellite is scheduled from the Baikonur spaceport in Kazakhstan for June 8, Russia’s State Space Corporation Roscosmos said on Tuesday.

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"Under the federal and the commercial programs, Roscosmos plans in June-July 2017 to carry out two launches from the Baikonur cosmodrome. A Proton-M carrier rocket with an EchoStar-21 satellite on June 8 and a Soyuz-2.1a carrier rocket with a Kanopus-V-IK satellite on July 14," Roscosmos said in a statement obtained by TASS.

According to the statement, the launch of the Proton carrier rocket is scheduled for 06:45 Moscow time on June 8. The previous launch of this carrier rocket took place on June 9, 2016.

Under the program, two launches to the International Space Station are planned from the Baikonur space center: a Soyuz 2.1a carrier rocket is to blast off together with a Progress MS-06 space freighter on June 14 and a Soyuz-FG is planned to be launched on July 28 with a Soyuz-MS-05 manned spacecraft.

The EchoStar-21 is a powerful geostationary communications satellite made by Space Systems/Lora on order from the global satellite communications operator EchoStar Corporation (USA).

The EchoStar-21 is designed to provide mobile communications on the territory of Europe. The commercial spacecraft is to become the sixth satellite in the EchoStar orbital grouping launched by the Russian Proton carrier rocket.

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