Photos: Atlas 5 rocket soars from West Coast

The 377th Delta rocket begins its journey to space carrying a military communications satellite funded by Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and New Zealand in a deal that gives the allies access to the U.S. military’s worldwide Wideband Global SATCOM system.

SpaceX has filed a protest challenging a nearly $150 million NASA contract awarded to United Launch Alliance last month to send a robotic asteroid probe into space.

Ready to double its Florida launch capacity with two pads, SpaceX is preparing to loft a reused robotic cargo ship toward the International Space Station Wednesday with a recycled Falcon 9 booster, debuting a rebuilt launch complex knocked offline more than a year ago in a fiery blast during pre-flight testing.