Live coverage: H-2A rocket lifts off from Japan with navigation satellite

SpaceX test-fired 27 main engines on a Falcon Heavy rocket Thursday in Florida, clearing a hurdle before installing three commercial communications satellites on the launcher for a mission to geostationary orbit later this month.

SpaceX’s second Falcon Heavy rocket lifted off Thursday with the Arabsat 6A communications satellite. The world’s most powerful operational launcher lifted off from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 6:35 p.m. EDT (2235 GMT), and its three first stage boosters landed less than 10 minutes later — two back at Cape Canaveral and one on a drone ship at sea.

The tiny European Philae lander after its historic touchdown on comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko has apparently ended as batteries depleted and the craft fell asleep Friday night.