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ILS Proton Launches "Integral" Spacecraft
26th Consecutive Successful Flight

BAIKONUR COSMODROME, Kazakhstan, Oct. 17, 2002 - A Russian-built
Proton-K/Block DM2 launch vehicle successfully placed the European 
Space Agency's Integral spacecraft into orbit this morning. The 
purpose of the Integral mission is to study space gamma-rays using 
high-accuracy in-orbit equipment and conduct observations in the gamma 
and x-ray band and visible spectrum.

This was the sixth mission this year for the Proton, and the 26th
consecutive successful flight in 2½ years. The vehicle lifted off from
Baik1onur at 10:41 a.m. Wednesday local time (8:41 a.m. Moscow, 0441 
GMT); separation of the satellite and launch vehicle occurred about an 
hour and a half later, at 2:14 p.m. EDT (12:14 a.m. Baikonur, 06:14 
GMT).

The Proton launch vehicle injected the Integral spacecraft into a 
highly elliptical transfer orbit of 685 km by 153,000 km (426 mi x 
95,070 mi), which no other existing launch vehicle is able to reach. 
Integral will use its own propulsion system to reach its operating 
orbit of 9,000 km by 155,000 km (5,592 mi x 96,313 mi).

Of Proton's six missions this year, this was the third conducted under 
the Russian Federal Program. Three also have been conducted under the 
auspices of International Launch Services (ILS), the joint venture of 
Lockheed Martin Corp. of the United States and Russian companies 
Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center and RSC Energia. 
ILS markets and manages the missions for the Proton and the American 
Atlas rockets.

ILS offers the broadest range of launch services in the world along 
with products with the highest reliability in the industry. ILS' Atlas 
rockets and their Centaur upper stages are built by Lockheed Martin 
Space Systems Co. The Proton vehicle is assembled by Khrunichev at its 
plant near Moscow.  The Block DM upper stage is built by Energia, also 
near Moscow.

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