Live coverage: Falcon 9 disintegrates after launch

NASA announced Friday a mix of spaceflight veterans and rookie astronauts who will launch on the first flights of new Boeing and SpaceX commercial spaceships starting as soon as next spring, several months later than previously scheduled.

A Progress supply craft loaded with 3.1 tons of cargo lifted off Thursday from Kazakhstan, launching on a six-hour pursuit of the International Space Station culminating with a smooth docking to the research lab’s aft port.

A $110 million NASA science instrument twice targeted for cancellation by the Trump administration is set for launch Tuesday inside the trunk of a SpaceX Dragon cargo capsule for delivery to the International Space Station, where it will spend three years charting changing carbon dioxide concentrations in Earth’s atmosphere.