Posted: Tue, May 6, 2014, 7:58 PM ET (2358 GMT)
A Soyuz rocket placed into orbit Tuesday what is thought to be one of the last in a older series of military reconnaissance satellites. The Soyuz-2.1a rocket lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 9:49 am EDT (1349 GMT, 5:49 pm Moscow time) and placed its payload into a polar orbit. The satellite, identified as both Cosmos 2492 and Cosmos 2495 in different reports, is believed to be a Kobalt-M reconnaissance satellite for the Russian military, an older model that returns imagery to Earth on film in recoverable canisters, rather than downlinking the images electronically.

Related Links:

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