MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Russia’s Roscosmos space corporation has set November 23 as the launch date for a Proton carrier rocket with a US telecommunications satellite, the corporation’s schedule published on Thursday stated.
"The launch of the EchoStar-21 unmanned spacecraft on the Proton-M launch vehicle with the Briz-M upper stage is scheduled from Baikonur on November 23," the schedule states.
EchoStar 21, built by Space Systems/Loral with estimated operational life of 15 years, is expected to extend constellation of Echostar satellites and will provide 2 GHz mobile voice and data communications utilizing S-band transponders mainly with European coverage.
