With but minutes to go before the liftoff of an Ariane-5 rocket carrying two satellites, mission control noticed a glitch with the water cooling system that so alarmed engineers, the launch was immediately aborted.

Engineers noticed a problem with the ‘water deluge’ cooling system, which sends millions of gallons of water at the exact moment of lift-off, both to cool the launch pad and to minimize vibrations which could damage the precious satellite cargo on board.

Two high-tech comms satellites, worth millions of dollars, were saved from an explosion on launch, and are set to be launched on Monday, should engineers give the all clear for a safe launch. One of the satellites is for Britain’s Ministry of Defence and for military communcations, and is part of a massive £3.6bn programme. The second satellite is the Insat 4B which provides civilian communications and has been commissioned by India's Space Research Organisation.

Reuters reported the President of the Arianespace rocket launch company, Jean Yves Le Gall, as saying in a statement that: “We were not able to correct our water tower anomaly in time. We will attempt to correct the problem with an objective of launching on Sunday”, although other reports suggest Monday will be the new launch day.

For more information, please visit the www.arianespace.com website.
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