Athena II launch failure: the payload fairing failed to separate during the third-stage burn, and the retained mass kept Space Imaging's IKONOS-1 commercial Earth-imaging satellite from reaching orbit; it reentered over the South Pacific.
- Outcome
- Failure
- Orbit
- PO
- Polar orbit
- Payload to orbit
- Did not reach orbit
- Flight
- 2nd
- of 3 Athena II flights
- Date and time
- 27 April 1999, 18:22 UTC
- Rocket
- Athena II
- Builder
- LM
- Launch site
- Space Launch Complex 6, Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
- Payload
- Earth Science
- Launches in 1999
- 22nd of 78