Russian booster fails to put satellites in transit orbit

Russia launched a Proton rocket with Briz-M booster carrying the Telkom-3 and the Express MD2 satellites at 11.31 p.m. Moscow time [19:31 GMT] from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan , Kazinform refers to RIA Novosti.

"The Briz-M booster and the two satellites have not been detected on the transition orbit," Roscosmos said in a statement on its website. "The signal from the booster has been received from an interim emergency orbit, instead."

According to preliminary data, Briz-M fired engines at a scheduled time, but they worked only for seven seconds rather than the programmed 18 minutes and 5 seconds.

"The chances that the satellites will separate from the booster and reach the designated orbit are practically non-existent," a space industry source told RIA Novosti.

He added that the launches of Proton rockets with Briz boosters would most likely be suspended until experts determine the cause of the failure  and the launch schedule would be adjusted accordingly.

Telkom-3 satellite has been built by Russia's Reshetnev space company with its communication equipment made by Thales Alenia Space. It has a capacity of 42 C- and Ku-band active transponders to provide telecoms services for Indonesian customers.

This is the first time Indonesia has bought a satellite from Russia.

The Express MD2 is a small communication satellite, designed and manufactured by the Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center for the Russian Satellite Communications Company(RSCC).

The satellite features 8 C-band transponders and 1 L-band transponder to relay, round-the-clock, data streams to multiple users within the Russian Satellite Communications and Broadcasting System.