Proton M Rocket Launches Satellite for Russia’s Ministry of Defense

The Proton rocket lifting off with the Blagovest №11 satellite on August 17, 2017. Photo: Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation

International Launch Services (ILS) announced the Proton Breeze M launch vehicle successfully orbited the Blagovest №11 satellite for the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. The Aug. 17 launch was the 100th heavy lift for Proton M, which has been in use since 2001, and the 414th launch in the Proton rocket since its maiden flight in 1965.

Information Satellite Systems – Reshetnev Company designed and built the Blagovest satellite around its unpressurized heavy-class Express-2000 platform. The company stated Blagovest is the first satellite that has a payload fully designed and manufactured by ISS-Reshetnev. The satellite is intended to provide high speed internet access, communications services, television and radio broadcasting, telephony and videoconferencing, according to the company.

Blagovest №11 took off at 01:07 Moscow time from the Baikonur cosmodrome atop a Proton-M launcher. Nine minutes into the flight the fairing enclosing the Breeze-M upper stage and the Blagovest satellite successfully separated from the launch vehicle. The satellite will orbit the Earth on the geostationary orbit 36,000 kilometers above the equator.