Live coverage: Falcon 9 disintegrates after launch

SpaceX’s fifth Falcon 9 launch in a little more than three weeks delivered 52 more Starlink internet satellites and two small hitchhiker payloads to orbit after a booming blastoff from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Saturday evening.

The Starlink 10-34 mission was SpaceX’s 80th Falcon 9 launch of the year. Liftoff from pad 40 occurred at 12:26 a.m. EDT (0426 UTC).

Expertise, input and advice from seasoned NASA engineers will improve SpaceX’s chances of nailing the first commercial landing on Mars as soon as late 2018, a senior space agency official said Wednesday, but Elon Musk’s space transport company will likely seek more independence from U.S. government support on later expeditions to the red planet.