I wrote here on 2021-11-30 about the European Space Agency’s Galileo navigation system being filled out to full operational status by a series of Soyuz launches, each carrying two satellites. The first of these launches is planned for 2021-12-03 at 00:27 UTC (the evening of Thursday the 2nd in Western hemisphere time zones) from the European spaceport in French Guiana. This will be the 26th launch of a Soyuz rocket from Kourou since flights of the Russian-made boosters began from that launch pad in 2011.
The launch has been postponed for 24 hours due to failure of a downrange tracking station. The same video player should work for the launch attempt to-morrow.
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Postponed again due to lightning in the vicinity of the launch site.
https://twitter.com/arianespaceceo/status/1466929941098995712
After delays due to a tracking station failure and weather, the VS26 Soyuz/Galileo mission was launched at 00:19 UTC on 2021-12-05. Here is a replay of the launch which I have cued to start one minute before liftoff.
