Live coverage: Vega rocket launches with LISA Pathfinder

An Ariane 5 rocket launched from French Guiana at 2150 GMT (5:50 p.m. EDT) Thursday with a pair of European-built communications satellites for the Brazilian government and KTsat, a South Korean telecom operator. Liftoff was delayed more than one hour to resolve a problem with ground equipment.

NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken returned to Earth Sunday with an on-target splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico at 2:48 p.m. EDT (1848 GMT) Sunday. The astronauts completed a two-month stay on the International Space Station on a test flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft.

The launch will be managed by Arianespace and will carry the third satellite for the Optical Space Component (CSO– Composante Spatiale Optique) program. Liftoff is scheduled for Thursday, March 6, at 1:24 p.m. Kourou time (11:24 a.m. EST, 1624 UTC).