Stats: Delta 4 history and backlog (updated March 30)

The 200th Atlas-Centaur rocket, history some 52 years in the making, will blast off Tuesday from Cape Canaveral to deliver a U.S. Navy mobile communications satellite into orbit.

With a 2-to-1 thrust-to-weight ratio, the million-pound United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket unleashed two-million pounds of ground-shaking thrust to power away from its seaside launch complex at 2:13 p.m. EST (1913 GMT) Sunday with the EchoStar 19 satellite.

United Launch Alliance could load cryogenic methane and liquid oxygen propellants into a Vulcan rocket test article at Cape Canaveral for the first time in the coming weeks, timing key tests for the next-generation rocket in between flights of Atlas 5 rockets that will share the same launch complex for the next few years.