Q&A with Michel Denis, ExoMars flight director

Launching from the edge of the Amazon jungle in South America, a Russian-built Soyuz booster fired into orbit Friday night with a Spanish-owned communications satellite built in Germany to test new commercial telecom technologies and provide video, voice and data relay services.

Packed with food, hardware and experiments in biology, Earth science and space technology, a Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon supply ship lifted off Monday from Cape Canaveral destined for the International Space Station.

The European Space Agency’s Aeolus winds observatory is set for liftoff aboard a Vega rocket to kick off a three-year mission to measure global wind profiles from an orbit nearly 200 miles (320 kilometers) above Earth.