Article Posted on : - Sep 13, 2010

An artistic representation of Sirius XM-5 satellite.

MOSCOW (BNS): Russian Proton-M heavy carrier rocket will launch a telecommunications satellite for Sirius XM radio in October, 2010, a media report said on Sunday.

Russian An-124 Ruslan cargo plane has landed at the Baikonur Space Center in Kazakhstan with a telecommunication satellite, for the upcoming launch of US Sirius XM-5 spacecraft by Proton-M/Breeze-M.

The Russian space agency and its other entities have started the pre-launch processing of the launch rocket and the satellite at its test centers, Roscosmos said on its website.

In 2010, Proton-M heavy carrier rocket has already launched five foreign satellites, the launch of Sirius satellite in October will be the sixth in series. All four previous Sirius satellites were launched on Proton rockets.

Sirius Satellite Radio is a satellite radio (SDARS) service operating in the United States and Canada, owned by Sirius XM Radio.

The launch is expected to take place on October 14.