Early this morning, an Ariane 5 launcher lifted off from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana on its mission to place two telecommunications satellites, Astra-1N and BSAT-3c/JCSAT-110R, into their planned transfer orbits.

The target injection orbit had a perigee altitude of 249.6 km, an apogee altitude at injection of 35 959 km and an inclination of 2º.

The satellites were accurately injected into their transfer orbits about 27 minutes and 38 minutes after liftoff, respectively.

Astra-1N will be positioned above the equator at 19.2°E. It will provide direct-to-home television broadcast services in Europe.

BSAT-3c/JCSAT-110R, to be positioned over 110°E, will provide mainly television broadcast services in Japan.

The payload mass for this launch was 9095 kg; the satellites totalled 8240 kg, with payload adapters and dispensers making up the additional 855 kg.