Posted: Fri, Oct 15, 2010, 7:59 AM ET (1159 GMT)
A Proton rocket successfully launched the latest spacecraft for satellite radio operator Sirius XM early Friday. The Proton M lifted off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 2:53 pm EDT Thursday (1853 GMT Thursday, 12:53 am local time Friday) and released the XM 5 satellite into a geostationary transfer orbit a little over nine hours later. The spacecraft, a Space Systems/Loral 1300-series spacecraft, weighed nearly 6,000 kilograms at launch. The spacecraft will eventually be located at 85.2 degrees west in GEO and serve as an on-orbit spare for existing spacecraft providing satellite radio programming to customers in North America. The launch was the ninth Proton mission of 2010, six of which, including this one, were commercial.

Related Links:

•  Spaceflight Now article
•  NASASpaceFlight.com article
•  RIA Novosti article
•  Itar-Tass article
•  ILS press release