STS-135 crew module camera: astronauts rocket off the launch pad

Watch a time lapse replay of SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 rocket being raised vertical Thursday at launch pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida for a mock countdown and engine test, ahead of a scheduled liftoff this weekend with an Intelsat communications satellite.

Former Johnson Space Center Director Christopher Columbus Kraft Jr., the man who created the iconic role of NASA flight director during the Mercury and Gemini programs and whose no-nonsense, uncompromising management style defined control room operations and discipline through the Apollo years and beyond, died Monday. He was 95.

America’s first space shuttle launched on this day 35 years ago as the reusable flying machine, Columbia, lifted off from Kennedy Space Center with John Young and Bob Crippen aboard.