Russia's Soyuz-FG carrier rocket set off from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan on 22 July 2012. The rocket will put the Russian satellites Canopus-B and MKA-PN1, a Belarusian BKA satellite, the Canadian ADS-1B and German TET-1 into orbit.
The Canopus-B satellite, developed by the All-Russia Research Institute of Electromechanics, is designed for remote sensing of the Earth. It weighs about 400 kg and will work on a circular orbit at a height of 510 km.
The MKA-PN1 satellite, developed by Russia's NPO Lavochkin aerospace company, will collect data to help meteorologists build models of ocean circulation - particularly in Arctic waters along Russian shores - and climate dynamics.
The German TET-1 satellite, a part of the German Aerospace Center's On-Orbit Verification Program, will conduct a test on new space technologies.
The ADS-1B satellite, built by the Com Dev aerospace company, will form part of a ship-identification satellite system.
The satellites were earlier planned to be launched in the first half of 2012, but was postponed several times as Kazakhstan kept the decision to let Russia use its territory for rocket launch on hold.
Russia got the permission to launch the rocket following a meeting between Kazakh Prime Minister Karim Massimov and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev in June 2012.
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