Russia loses newly launched satellite

The government space agency said, the latest in a series of failures that has dogged the nations space programme.The Express-AM4 satellite, described by officials as Russias most powerful telecommunications satellite, was launched atop a Proton-M booster rocket from the Russia-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The Federal Space Agency said in a statement the booster itself worked fine, but a subsequent failure of the additional upper stage, the Briz-M, resulted in the loss of communications with the satellite. It said efforts were being made to re-establish contact with the 5.8-ton (6.38-ton) craft.The satellite has been insured for 7.5 billion rubles (about $260 million or euro180 million) with Russian Ingosstrakh insurance company. The satellite was to be put into a geostationary orbit to provide digital TV broadcasting for Russias far eastern regions. Broadcasters said that the failure would likely delay the planned transfer to digital TV.The Briz-M upper stage has experienced several failures, most recently in February when its malfunction led to the loss of a Russian military satellite.