Russia launches Soyuz rocket with dozens of satellites, including two from Iran

Russia launched a Soyuz rocket early on Tuesday carrying two satellites designed to monitor the space weather around Earth and 53 small satellites, including two Iranian ones, Russia’s Roscosmos space agency said.

The Soyuz-2.1 launch spacecraft, which lifted off from Russia’s Vostochny Cosmodrome, carried two Ionosfera-M satellites, which will become part of the space system for monitoring the Earth’s ionosphere, the agency said.

 Two Ionosfera-M heliogeophysical satellites were successfully put into orbit after blasting off atop a Soyuz-2.1b rocket from Vostochny Spaceport, Roscosmos said in a statement.

"The heliogeophysical satellites Ionosfera-M No. 1 and No. 2 were placed into the Earth's sun-synchronous orbit," the statement said.

The rocket also carried 53 other satellites.