Live coverage: Ariane 5 blasts off on commercial flight

Greg Wyler has corralled blue-chip companies to invest in his dream to beam affordable broadband Internet signals around the world, a mission he sees as a prerequisite to providing billions of unconnected, underserved people with the tools necessary to succeed in a modern marketplace of goods, services and information.

SpaceX test-fired a previously-flown Falcon 9 rocket Monday evening on pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, setting the stage for a launch later this week carrying the Japanese-built, Qatari-owned Es’hail 2 communications satellite to orbit.

Two weeks after a launch pad fire forced a delay, a Japanese H-2B rocket lifted off Tuesday with an HTV cargo freighter to deliver upgraded batteries, experiments and provisions to the International Space Station. Liftoff from the Tanegashima Space Center occurred at 1605 GMT (12:05 p.m. EDT) Tuesday.