Video: Change of command aboard International Space Station

In one of its final preflight tests, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket ignited at pad 39A in Florida for several seconds Thursday, ramping up to full throttle in an end-to-end checkout of the booster before liftoff next week on a space station resupply flight.

The Cygnus commercial logistics vehicle departed the International Space Station Sunday morning for a week-long free-flight filled with autonomous science tasks before re-entry.

A veteran Russian cosmonaut, a Japanese flight engineer and a NASA scientist-astronaut undocked from the International Space Station and returned to Earth Saturday, landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan to close out a 115-day mission.