Posted: Thu, Sep 23, 2004, 8:26 PM ET (0026 GMT)
A Kosmos-3M booster successfully launched a pair of small Russian military satellites Thursday evening. The Kosmos booster lifted off from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia at 11:14 am EDT (1514 GMT, 7:14 pm Moscow time) Thursday and placed two satellites into their target orbits within an hour. Russian news sources identified the two spacecraft as Kosmos 2408 and 2409, but offered no other information about their mission other than to "build up the orbital group of military satellites". Similar launches in the recent past using Kosmos vehicles from Plesetsk have been used to deploy pairs of Strela store-and-forward communications satellites. The launch was not announced in advance, although Russian military officials told Itar-Tass the launch had been delayed a day because of poor weather at the launch site. The launch was the second Kosmos-3M launch of the year; the first placed a military navigation satellite into orbit in July.

Related Links:

•  Itar-Tass article
•  Interfax article
•  MosNews article