* Astronomy

Astrium has successfully placed the THEOS observation satellite, built for Thailand, into orbit.
François Auque, CEO of Astrium, congratulated GISTDA, the Thai space agency, on this success and also for the fact that Thailand now has a space observation capability. He continued: "This success reaffirms the excellence of the Astrium teams in all areas of space from architect to constructor. With THEOS, Astrium has been responsible for all phases, from manufacture to launch, and from orbit injection to utilisation of satellite data for its customer. He added that this success also results from a major cooperation and training programme between Astrium and GISTDA.

Source

The  Thai THEOS satellite is to be launched atop Dnepr rocket,  a converted RS-20 (SS-18 Satan) intercontinental ballistic missile, on October 1 from the Dombarovsky launch facility in Russia's southern Urals.

The launch of the THEOS satellite has been postponed to a future date.
The new launch date will be announced as soon as a launch window is confirmed.

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"The launch scheduled for today has been postponed to an alternated time"  - Kosmotras spokesperson.

 Russia will launch on August 6 a converted RS-20 Voyevoda intercontinental ballistic missile to put a Thai earth observation satellite into orbit, the Strategic Missile Forces said on Monday.
The launch from a silo in the southern Urals will be carried out under a contract with Kosmotras, a Russian-Ukrainian joint venture, which converts RS-20 (SS-18 Satan) intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM), scrapped by Russia's Strategic Missile Forces, into Dnepr launch vehicles.

"The missile, which was decommissioned in 2005 and kept in storage at the Yasny launch site in southern Urals, has been approved as a launch vehicle for spacecraft" - SMF spokesman.

The THEOS satellite was designed and manufactured by French company EADS Astrium under a 2004 contract with the Thai Ministry of Science and Technology. The launch has been delayed twice due to Russia's failure to agree with Uzbekistan on where to let spent rocket stages fall.
THEOS will provide Thailand with worldwide geo-referenced image products and image-processing capabilities for applications in cartography, land use, agricultural monitoring, forestry management, coastal zone monitoring, and flood risk management.
The Thai satellite will be the third to be launched by Russia's SMF and Kosmotras from the Yasny launch site. Russia launched the Genesis I and Genesis II inflatable spacecraft from the same location in July 2006 and June 2007, respectively, under a contract with U.S.-based company Bigelow Aerospace.

Source Novosti