spacetoday.net: Soyuz launches rideshare mission

Posted: Fri, Mar 26, 2021, 5:53 PM ET (2153 GMT)
A Soyuz rocket launched a cluster of smallsats early Monday after a two-day delay. The Soyuz-2.1a rocket lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 2:07 am EDT (0607 GMT) carrying a payload of 38 satellites, with South Korea's CAS500-1 remote sensing satellite the primary passenger. The launch was scheduled for Saturday but scrubbed because of a control system problem with the Fregat upper stage. Other payloads on the Soyuz include Astroscale's ELSA-d spacecraft, which will test active debris removal technologies, and the first nanosatellite for Sateliot, a Spanish internet-of-things startup.