Photos: Falcon takes flight

The adjustment of the launch manifest is in line with NASA’s desire to have a direct handover between its two long-duration crews on the International Space Station.

An innovative commercial Capella radar observation spacecraft with night vision and a small payload from the California-based smallsat manufacturer Tyvak are set to ride into orbit from Florida’s Space Coast Saturday with 52 more Starlink internet satellites on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

Throttling up to more than a million pounds of thrust at SpaceX’s Central Texas test facility, a Falcon 9 rocket booster recovered after a commercial satellite launch in May passed a key milestone Thursday as the company sets its sights on re-flying a used first stage on a mission this fall.