Photos: Gantry retracted from Atlas 5

Launching a highly sophisticated infrared surveillance satellite for the U.S. military, a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket thunders away from Cape Canaveral.

NOAA’s newest weather satellite, heading for a perch with coverage over the western United States and the Pacific Ocean, launched March 1 from Cape Canaveral on top of an Atlas 5 rocket.

The detective work into the Atlas 5 rocket’s first stage performance trouble during the Cygnus cargo ship launch a week ago has implicated the fuel system as the likely culprit for using up the liquid oxygen supply too quickly.