Photos: Falcon takes flight

An experiment-carrying, reusable mini space shuttle operated by the U.S. Air Force will be boosted into Earth orbit Wednesday atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket.

A 229-foot-tall (70-meter) SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket stood on launch pad 39A on Monday afternoon on the eve of a scheduled blastoff with the EchoStar 23 television broadcast satellite.

The mission will bring the total number of orbital launches from Florida in 2024 to 72, tying the total for 2023. Liftoff happened on Wednesday at 5:47 p.m. EDT (2147 UTC) from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.