Video: Atlas/Cygnus pre-launch news conference

A Russian Soyuz ferry ship carrying a Russian cosmonaut and two NASA astronauts undocked from the International Space Station early Thursday, flew a lap around the 20-year-old outpost for a photo survey and then plunged back to Earth, making a pinpoint landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan to wrap up a 197-day stay in space.

Air Force meteorologists are giving good odds of acceptable weather conditions for the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket to fly Friday morning from Cape Canaveral to put a Navy mobile communications satellite into orbit.

The space plane was brought to the Kennedy Space Center in May 2024 with plans to launch later that year. Now, its first flight is no earlier than late 2026.