STS-133 onboard camera launch video

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei and two Russian cosmonauts will ride a Soyuz ferry ship to the International Space Station early Friday, the first step in a record crew rotation requiring two launches and two landings with four different spacecraft in just three weeks.

A broadband communications satellite for Paris-based Eutelsat — built on a new Thales Alenia Space all-electric design with xenon plasma thrusters — and an Indian broadcasting spacecraft are fastened to the top of an Ariane 5 launcher for liftoff Thursday from French Guiana.

A solid-fueled Kuaizhou 1A launcher carried a commercial broadband communications satellite into orbit Thursday for Galaxy Space, a Chinese company that says it plans to launch up to 144 spacecraft for a space-based 5G network in the next few years.