Live coverage: Orion lands in Pacific

Two days after launching from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, three new crew members arrived Friday at the International Space Station to begin a six-month stay. Docking of the crew’s Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft to the station’s Rassvet module occurred at 9:01 a.m. EDT (1301 GMT).

The sixth and final satellite in the U.S. military’s network of ultra-secure, nuclear-hardened AEHF communications relay stations has arrived in Florida for final preparations for liftoff in March on a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket, the first of nearly 20 U.S. Space Force missions planned for launch in the first year of operations for the new military service.

A solid-fueled Minotaur 4 rocket lifted off from Wallops Island, Virginia at 9:46 a.m. EDT (1346 GMT) Wednesday. The four-stage rocket, comprised of retired Peacekeeper missile parts, launched on a mission to deliver four classified payloads into orbit for the National Reconnaissance Office.