Video: Falcon/DSCOVR prelaunch news conference

After waiting nearly two decades for dream to become reality, former Vice President Al Gore said Sunday the mission he fostered in 1998 — finally ready for launch this week — will have important scientific and social impacts in humanity’s relationship with Earth.

This narrated video clip shows NOAA’s Deep Space Climate Observatory being readied for launch atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

NOAA’s Deep Space Climate Observatory, a $340 million mission that spent more than a decade grounded in a Maryland warehouse, will begin warning forecasters of dangerous solar storms next month, giving notice of events that could disrupt air travel, radio communications, electrical grids and satellite operations.