Live coverage: Atlas 5 blasts off with Navy satellite

Tucked inside a shipping crate aboard an Air Force C-5 transport aircraft, the Navy’s next mobile communications satellite has flown from California to Florida in preparation for liftoff this summer.

SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 rocket arrived at Kennedy Space Center’s pad 39A on Thursday for a hold-down engine firing ahead of launch next week with the U.S. Air Force’s X-37B spaceplane. The brief engine ignition occurred at 4:30 p.m. EDT (2030 GMT).

Launching from Vandenberg Air Force Base on California’s Central Coast on its third try, United Launch Alliance’s Delta 2 rocket lifted off Saturday with NOAA’s JPSS 1 polar-orbiting weather satellite.