Photos: More Delta 4 launch shots

See images of a classified spy payload lifted on top of a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

Fifty years to the day after Neil Armstrong stepped onto the surface of the moon, a NASA astronaut, an Italian flight engineer and a Russian commander geared up for launch aboard a Soyuz spacecraft Saturday on a six-hour flight to the International Space Station.

This is the launch timeline to be followed by the Atlas 5 rocket’s ascent into orbit from Cape Canaveral with the GOES-S weather satellite. Launch is scheduled for Thursday during a two-hour window opening at 5:02 p.m. EST (2202 GMT).