Atlas rocket soars on maiden flight

The Atlas 5 blasts into space Wednesday.

(CNN) -- One of the most powerful rockets since the Saturn 5, which took the Apollo astronauts to the moon, debuted Wednesday, blasting into space from a Florida launch pad.

The Atlas 5, intended to carry twice the capacity of previous Atlases, lifted off in the evening sky from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station carrying a European-built telecommunications satellite.

Developed at an estimated cost of $1.5 billion, the rocket was built at the behest of the U.S. Air Force, which sought a more powerful launch vehicle to send payloads into space.

For the maiden launch, the Lockheed Martin-built Atlas 5 carried the Hotbird 6, a Eutelsat satellite that will deliver television and radio programming across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.

Before the launch, space officials expressed confidence in the new design, based on the track record of previous Atlas rockets, which have flown 60 times without a hitch over the past nine years.

EXTRA INFORMATION Tracking satellites in orbit (NASA site)

"We are committed to mission success, as evidenced by Atlas' enviable record. All Atlas variants -- Atlas 1, 2, 2A, 2AS, 3 -- have had successful inaugural mission," said Mark Albrecht, president of International Launch Services, which organizes Atlas launches.

Russia-based Energia company, which makes Soyuz spacecraft and international space station components, built the first-stage engines for the Atlas 5.

The inaugural Atlas 5 is a no-frills model with two stages, one powered by liquid oxygen and kerosene, another fueled by liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen.

In the future, more robust Atlas 5s are expected to take almost two times the payload of past Atlas 3s, or slightly more than four tons of cargo into geostationary orbit, which is about 22,241 miles (35,786 kilometers) above the Earth's surface.

Despite Air Force hopes that the Atlas 5 would slash space travel costs, its debut takes place during a prolonged slump in commercial satellite launches.

A glut of other new-generation rockets completed or in the works, along with a weak satellite launch market in the coming years, could mean fewer Atlases are built to recoup development costs, according to commercial aerospace officials.