A balky interplanetary seismic instrument that ran into technical problems in 2015, forcing a two-year delay in the launch of NASA’s InSight lander to Mars, cleared a major test last week after engineers redesigned part of the sensor package, boosting confidence that the mission will be ready to blast off in May 2018.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket fired into the night sky over Cape Canaveral just after midnight Wednesday, carrying the U.S. Air Force’s fourth AEHF communications satellite designed to enable secure voice, video and data links between U.S. and allied forces.

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket from California’s Central Coast at 10:42:18 a.m. PST (1:42:18 p.m. EST; 1842:18 GMT) Sunday with the Jason 3 oceanography satellite. A secondary objective of the mission to recover the first stage on a barge in the Pacific Ocean failed.