Photos: Falcon takes flight

Christopher Ferguson, commander of the final space shuttle flight and now a Boeing executive, has stepped down as commander of the first piloted test flight of the company’s troubled CST-100 Starliner commercial spacecraft, he and Boeing announced Wednesday. He has been replaced by NASA astronaut Barry “Butch” Wilmore.

Launch preparations for the SES 10 communications satellite, the first spacecraft to ride a reused Falcon 9 booster to space, are on track for a late March blastoff from Florida, officials said.

SpaceX test-fired a Falcon Heavy rocket Wednesday night at the Kennedy Space Center in preparation for launch June 24 with a stack of weather observation and technology demonstration satellites.