Photos: Atlas 5 rocket aims for International Space Station

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched at 4:25 p.m. EST (2125 GMT) on 31 January from Cape Canaveral with the GovSat 1 communications satellite.

For the second time in less than 24 hours, a robotic resupply freighter departed Earth Friday for the International Space Station, this time aboard a Russian Soyuz booster launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Poised to loft a Russian-German X-ray astronomy observatory into space Friday, a Proton rocket returned to its launch pad Tuesday at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan after a three-week delay to replace a drained battery on the vehicle.