Photos: Atlas 5 rocket soars from West Coast

The next flight of China’s heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket will debut a new configuration designed to launch modules for a Chinese space station. But a demonstration launch of the Long March 5B booster scheduled as soon as April will instead carry a prototype of China’s next-generation deep space crew capsule into orbit on an unpiloted test flight.

SpaceX aims to launch the first Falcon Heavy rocket in November, company chief Elon Musk said Thursday, the latest in a series of schedule targets for the heavy-lift launcher’s delayed debut.

Chinese scientists and engineers are counting down to launch of a heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket Monday with the Chang’e 5 mission, an ambitious attempt to land on the moon, drill samples from beneath the lunar surface, and return the material to Earth.