On December 11, 2015 at 13:45 UTC the Russian " Zenit-2SB” rocket-carrier was launched from Baykonur Cosmodrome. The rocket equipped with the "Fregat-SB” booster (upper stage) orbited the Russian “Elektro-L” meteorological satellite. The satellite is beginning a 10-year mission to collect near-realtime images of weather systems from Europe to the Asia-Pacific.