Japanese satellite crashes, Russia suspends launches

A Japanese television satellite crashed just after take-off Thursday prompting a suspension of all satellite launches by Proton rocket from Russia’s Baikonur space centre in the steppes of Kazakhstan, Russian news agencies reported.

The JCSat 11 satellite crashed to Earth just 135 seconds after blasting off on the Russian Proton-M at 04:42 am (2242 GMT), Interfax news agency said. The rocket plunged into a remote corner of the Central Asian, ex-Soviet republic and no one was reported hurt.

The JCSat 11, intended to retransmit television broadcasts, was to have covered Japan, the Asia Pacific region and the Hawaii island group. Japan’s JSAT Corp said that the failure would have minimal effect since the new satellite was only planned as a replacement for an older version.

”This satellite was launched as a successor to an in-orbit backup satellite. The failure does not affect the communications and broadcasting services currently offered,” JSAT said.

Source: Media Network, AFP