Live coverage: Two satellites lift off aboard Ariane 5

A European Ariane 5 rocket took off on its first flight of the year Wednesday with a new-generation communications satellite for Intelsat, lighting up the sky over its French Guiana launch base as it arced over the Atlantic Ocean.

SpaceX and OneWeb — space industry rivals and owners of two of the largest fleets of commercial satellites — are set to add more spacecraft to their internet networks Wednesday with launches from Cape Canaveral and Russia.

Europe launched a sleek space plane more than 250 miles above Earth on Wednesday, testing its maneuverability, on-board guidance systems, and a next-generation heat shield as the experimental vehicle glided through the atmosphere toward a pinpoint splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.