0015 GMT (7:15 p.m. EST Tues.)
A statement has been issued by the customer of today's failed launch, SES NEW SKIES of The Hague, Netherlands.
"SES NEW SKIES, an SES company regrets to announce the failure of the launch of NSS 8, the sixth satellite in the SES NEW SKIES fleet, onboard a Zenith 3SL launch vehicle, and the resulting total loss of the satellite.
"SES NEW SKIES is currently not in a position to comment on the possible causes of the mission failure and is awaiting the results of the official investigation which is in the process of being installed.
"NSS 8 was built by Boeing, with launch services from the Odyssey Platform in the equatorial Pacific provided by Sea Launch. The spacecraft was intended to operate at SES NEW SKIES orbital position of 57 degrees East to replace the existing NSS 703 satellite.
"The launch failure of NSS 8 means that NSS 703 will now stay at 57 degrees East in order to continue to serve existing customers until at least 2009.
"SES NEW SKIES has already initiated the construction of NSS 9 for launch in 2009 into the Pacific Ocean Region. NSS 9 is intended to free up NSS 5 which in turn will then be free to relocate to 57 degrees to replace NSS 703.
"The NSS 8 launch failure is thus not expected to have an impact on existing customers or revenues."
I wonder what the "loss in lift capacity" cost is compared to the "loss of satellite cost" insurance if they could add some sort of Apollo's/Mercury's emergency ejection rocket to the nose.
Seems you could recover the payload (if it were kept dry on landing by a shroud) by an emergency jettison rocket.