Photos: Atlas 5 rocket soars from West Coast

The covert follow-on satellite program that will serve as a replacement to the nation’s surveillance “eyes” from space begins launching in 2018 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

SpaceX launched the first full-scale Starship and Super Heavy rocket from South Texas at 8:33 a.m. CDT (9:33 a.m. EDT; 1333 UTC Thursday). The nearly 40-story-tall rocket, the largest ever built, lifted off from the Starbase launch complex and flew downrange before veering out of control and exploding about four minutes into the flight.

A fourth trio of Chinese Yaogan military satellites with secret missions launched Thursday aboard a Long March 2C rocket from the Xichang space base in China’s Sichuan province.