Venus Express Launch Delayed

[MikeB]

During the final preparations for the launch of the European Space Agency’s Venus Express spacecraft by a Soyuz-Fregat launcher, contamination was detected inside the launcher’s fairing.

Starsem and ESA have therefore decided to carry out additional checks, which will postpone the originally scheduled launch date of Wednesday, 26 October by several days.

See ESA web site at http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Venus_Express/index.html for details about Venus Express.

Mike