Live coverage: Falcon 9 disintegrates after launch

SpaceX technicians are attaching a Japanese communications satellite to the top of a Falcon 9 rocket ahead of a planned launch Thursday morning from Cape Canaveral.

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is set for liftoff from Cape Canaveral on Sunday evening, heading due east over the Atlantic Ocean to deliver the Intelsat 35e communications satellite into orbit 32 minutes later.

The Starlink 17-12 mission will send the two dozen broadband internet satellites into a polar, low Earth orbit. SpaceX is targeting liftoff from pad 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base no earlier than Friday, Sept. 19, at 9:31 a.m. PDT (12:31 p.m. EDT / 1631 UTC).