Photos: Tuesday’s Atlas 5 rollout

A new weather observatory that will track storms across the globe as it orbits from pole to pole has been trucked to its launch site in California for a long-awaited ascent into space this November.

U.S. Air Force officials signed off Monday on a plan for SpaceX and United Launch Alliance, rivals in the launch services market, to fire off Falcon 9 and Atlas 5 rockets from neighboring launch pads at Cape Canaveral on Tuesday evening and Thursday morning.

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is set for liftoff from Cape Canaveral on Thursday carrying the U.S. Air Force’s first GPS 3-series navigation satellite destined for an orbit more than 12,000 miles above Earth.