Live coverage: Vega rocket deploys second Sentinel satellite

European Space Agency Director General Josef Aschbacher said Thursday the Ariane 6 is expected to launch for the first time between June 15 and July 31, 2024. The determination comes on the heels of what ESA determined to be a successful hot fire test of the rocket’s main engine.

Running several days late after a series of technical and weather delays, a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California at 6:17 a.m. PST (9:17 a.m. EST; 1417 GMT) with the Spanish-owned Paz radar observation satellite and two prototype payloads for SpaceX’s planned Starlink broadband satellite network.

A Russian Proton rocket blasted off from Kazakhstan on Friday on a critical launch aiming to complete deployment of a major multibillion-dollar global communications network for London-based Inmarsat. Liftoff occurred at 1144 GMT (7:44 a.m. EDT), but it will take more than 15 hours to put the satellite in the correct orbit.