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A Japanese rocket blasted off early Friday and successfully released a Venus probe and a kite-shaped "space yacht" designed to float through the cosmos using only the power of the sun.
The launch vehicle, the H-IIA rocket, took off from the Tanegashima space centre in southern Japan on schedule at 6:58 am (Thursday 2158 GMT), three days after its original launch was postponed by bad weather.
Live footage on the website of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) showed the rocket disappear into the sky.
The rocket released all of its six satellites within an hour, a JAXA spokesman said.
"All of the six satellites -- Akatsuki, Ikaros and four others developed by universities -- they were released successfully," he told AFP, adding that further details will be released later.
The rocket carried with it the experimental "Ikaros" -- an acronym for Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation
of the Sun -- designed to be propelled by the pressure of sunlight particles.
Similar to an ocean yacht pushed by wind, the device has a square, ultra-thin and flexible sail, measuring 14 by 14 metres (46 by 46 feet), that will be driven through space as it is pelted by solar particles.
The sail, only a fraction of the thickness of a human hair, is also partly coated with thin-film solar cells to generate electricity.
The name of the spacecraft alludes to Icarus, the figure from Greek mythology who flew too close to the sun. The space yacht, however, is headed in the direction of Venus.
Ikaros, which cost 1.5 billion yen (16 million dollars) to develop, will be the first use of the propellant-free technology in deep space, although it has been tested in orbit around the Earth before.
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