On October 29, 2009 at 20:00 UTC the Ariane 5 rocket was launched from the Guiana Space Center in Kourou on the northeastern coast of South America.

The rocket-carrier orbited the NSS 12 and Thor 6 commercial communications satellites.

NSS-12 belongs to the SES Global Luxemburg operator and will cover most of the Eastern Hemisphere for commercial and government customers stretching from Europe to the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Australia. The satellite was made by the Space Systems/Loral US company.

Thor 6 will serve the Nordic countries by Norwegian  operator Telenor Satellite Broadcasting. The satellite was made by Thales Alenia Space, French-Italian company.

For Arianespace, this launch represented the 48th flight for the Ariane 5 and the sixth in 2009.