Live coverage: Japanese cargo craft arrives at space station

The four-member crew will now fly onboard Dragon Endurance instead of SpaceX’s fifth Crew Dragon spacecraft as originally intended. Launch has moved up to Wednesday, March 12, “pending mission readiness and completion of the agency’s certification of flight readiness process.”

A solid-fueled Minotaur 4 rocket lifted off from Wallops Island, Virginia at 9:46 a.m. EDT (1346 GMT) Wednesday. The four-stage rocket, comprised of retired Peacekeeper missile parts, launched on a mission to deliver four classified payloads into orbit for the National Reconnaissance Office.

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will go from Cape Canaveral to low Earth orbit in less than 10 minutes Friday with a Dragon capsule heading for the International Space Station carrying more than 5,900 pounds of supplies and experiments.