Live coverage: Vega rocket launches with LISA Pathfinder

Views from Europe’s Rosetta comet orbiter show mysterious markings appearing on the nucleus of Comet 67P in recent months, with new surface features forming within a matter of weeks, and scientists are digging into the complex causes of the cometary erosion.

Arianespace’s launch team loaded an Ariane 5 rocket full of super-cold liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen propellants Tuesday for a fiery sunset blastoff from French Guiana at 2139 GMT (4:39 p.m. EST) with two European-built television broadcast satellites for Brazil and Indonesia.

Videos and photos help tell the story of Thursday’s launch of Europe’s LISA Pathfinder spacecraft, carrying high-tech thrusters and ultra-sensitive motion sensors to be used in a future gravitational wave detection mission, from French Guiana aboard a nearly 100-foot-tall (30-meter) Vega rocket.