Intended for operation by CNES, France Telecom, and Direction générale de l'armement (DGA).
The STENTOR technology demonstration satellite, to have been operated by the French space agency CNES, was aboard the launch vehicle.
[3] The launch took place from ELA-3 at Centre Spatial Guyanais, at Kourou, in French Guiana, at 22:22 UTC on 11 December 2002,[4] bound for Geostationary transfer orbit (GTO).
Around three minutes after liftoff, performance issues with the first stage's Vulcain 2 engine — which was making its first flight — began to be noted.
It began to lose altitude and speed, before being destroyed by range safety officer 456 seconds after launch.