The European Space Agency (ESA) and European industries have updated the planning of the preparatory activities for the GOCE satellite, with a tentative launch date of October 27th just announced. On September 7th, preparatory activities for the launch of GOCE from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia were halted by Eurockot. This halt of activities was due to an anomaly identified in one of the units of the guidance and navigation subsystem of the launcher's Upper Stage Breeze KM. Russian launcher authorities are completing the investigation of the failure and are implementing related corrective measures. The remaining activities on the launcher side, and the subsequent combined operations with the satellite, have led to a calculated launch date of Monday, October 27th, 2008, at 15:21 CET. Awaiting the final outcome of the failure investigations and the replacement of the affected units, the GOCE team has started preparatory activities in line with the proposed launch date.