Kourou, French Guiana – Yesterday evening at 17h52 (GMT), Ariane 5 successfully launched the largest commercial telecommunications satellite, named TerreStar-1.

Lightning has almost compromised the third Ariane launch of 2009, interrupting several times while the countdown was on. Despite these interruptions, TerreStar-1, presented as “the largest commercial telecommunications satellite ever launched,” has finally been placed into geostationary transfer orbit, where it will provide new U.S. and Canadian telecommunications for the operator TerreStar Networks Inc.

“With the launching of the commercial satellite, nearly 7 tons, two months after the launch of Herschel and Planck, with Ariane 5, we demonstrated our ability to provide a full range of missions : the launch of commercial satellites most heavy and the most complex scientific satellites, “said Arianespace CEO Jean-Yves Le Gall, to AFP.

Watch its take off: