Ariane Rocket Places Satellites into Orbit

The European Space Agency said an Ariane 5 ECA rocket has successfully placed two telecommunication satellites into Earth orbit.

The satellites, launched Saturday from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, were Star One C2, a telecommunications, multimedia and Internet satellite that will serve South America, and Vinasat-1, Vietnam’s first telecommunications satellite.

The space agency said the launch, the second of the year, keeps Arianespace and Europe’s Spaceport on target for the seven missions planned for 2008. Payload preparations and launcher assembly for the next flight are already in process.

Ariane 5 ECA is the latest version of the Ariane 5 launcher and is designed to place payloads weighing up to 9.6 tons into geostationary transfer orbit.