Live coverage: Falcon 9 disintegrates after launch

A United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket blasted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California at 5:49 a.m. local time (8:49 a.m. EDT; 1249 GMT) Thursday on the classified National Reconnaissance Office NROL-55 mission.

The ninth and final flight of Japan’s H-2B rocket — the country’s most powerful launcher — drove an automated cargo freighter into orbit Wednesday on a five-day pursuit of the International Space Station.

Watch a replay from a camera mounted on-board SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket as it released one of 10 Iridium Next communications satellites Monday nearly 400 miles above Earth.