Live coverage: Two satellites lift off aboard Ariane 5

A Russian-built Soyuz rocket moved to its launch pad on the northeastern coast of South America on Tuesday ahead of a Friday night flight with a Spanish-owned communications satellite to relay video and broadband signals between the Americas and Europe.

A Soyuz rocket soared into orbit after firing off a launch pad in the Amazon jungle Friday, deploying two satellites nearly 15,000 miles above Earth to expand Europe’s Galileo system helping locate automobiles, airliners, and millions of other users around the world.

SpaceX conducted its first launch from Florida in more than two months Thursday, when a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center with the Qatari Es’hail 2 communications satellite at 3:46 p.m. EST (2046 GMT). The Falcon 9’s reused first stage landed on SpaceX’s drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean.