MOSCOW. Feb 3 (Interfax-AVN) - The European Space Agency has delayed the test launch of its new Vega light booster rocket by several days.
"The launch has been postponed until February 13, although February 9 was picked for the launch earlier," a source in the Russian space industry with knowledge of the situation, told Interfax-AVN on Friday.
The launch has been delayed several times since 2008.
During its first flight the rocket will put a LARES satellite and nine Cubesat educational satellites into orbit.
The Vega will blast off from a launch pad initially built to launch the Arian-1 and Arian-3 rockets at the Kourou space center in French Guiana.
If the first launch is a success, three more test launches will follow, with 2-3 launches a year.
The European Space Agency has no light booster rockets of its own. Foreign-made booster rockets were used to launch small satellites, including Russian Rokot booster rockets.