Photos: Atlas 5 rocket soars from West Coast

NASA simulated an in-flight launch abort of an Orion crew capsule high above Cape Canaveral on Tuesday, in a major test of the safety system that would whisk astronauts on future moon missions away from a failing rocket.

Mission managers will be closely monitoring the weather for the first launch of astronauts aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft, not just around the Kennedy Space Center, but along a corridor stretching thousands of miles across the Atlantic Ocean in case the crew capsule has to escape from its Falcon 9 rocket during the climb into orbit.

Eagle? Freedom? GalaxyOne? United Launch Alliance wants public input in the naming of a next-generation launcher designed to replace the historic Atlas and Delta rocket lines in the 2020s.