Posted: Tue, Aug 5, 2014, 9:43 AM ET (1343 GMT)
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket successfully launched a commercial communications satellite in the pre-dawn hours Tuesday. The Falcon 9 v1.1 lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 4:00 am EDT (0800 GMT) Tuesday, and placed the AsiaSat 8 satellite into a geosynchronous transfer orbit. The launch took place near the end of a launch window that opened more than two and a half hours earlier. An unspecified technical problem with the Falcon 9 first stage delayed the launch attempt at the beginning of the window. AsiaSat 8, built by Space Systems Loral for Hong Kong-based AsiaSat, carries Ku- and Ka-band transponders to provide service from the Middle East to China. The launch was the fourth this year for the Falcon 9, but the second in just over three weeks, after an ORBCOMM launch in mid-July. A Falcon 9 will launch another AsiaSat satellite, AsiaSat 6, as soon as late August.
