Posted: Wed, Jul 22, 2009, 2:37 PM ET (1837 GMT)

A Kosmos rocket launched two satellites into orbit early Tuesday. The Kosmos-3M rocket lifted off from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia at 11:57 pm EDT Monday (0337 GMT Tuesday) and placed two small satellites into low Earth orbit. One satellite is a military satellite, most likely a Parus-series navigation satellite. The other satellite, Sterkh 1, is designed to be part of the international COSPAS-SARSAT search-and-rescue satellite system.