Photos: Sun sets on Falcon 9 rocket at Cape Canaveral

Ax-4 will mark the first time an astronaut from India or Poland visits the International Space Station. The mission will be commanded by former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, making her second trip to the ISS on behalf of Axiom Space.

A European Ariane 5 rocket took off from French Guiana and delivered two commercial communications satellites and a NASA scientific package to orbit Thursday after an unexpected radio blackout raised worries that the mission failed. But questions lingered early Friday about the accuracy of the payload deployments.

Four more satellites for SES Networks’ O3b broadband fleet launched Thursday aboard a Soyuz rocket. Liftoff of the Soyuz launcher from the Guiana Space Center in South America occurred at 1703 GMT (1:03 p.m. EDT).