Atlas 2AS rocket puts TV satellite in space

Rolling toward a mid-May deployment of a clandestine spy satellite, United Launch Alliance’s triple-body Delta 4-Heavy rocket moved from its Cape Canaveral assembly building to pad 37B yesterday.

The 200th Atlas-Centaur rocket, history some 52 years in the making, will blast off Tuesday from Cape Canaveral to deliver a U.S. Navy mobile communications satellite into orbit.

SpaceX plans to set up landing pads on abandoned launch sites at Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg Air Force Base in a step toward the company’s vision for eventual recovery and reuse of rocket boosters.