Photos: Spectacular start to Delta 4-Heavy’s satellite deployment mission

China launched the fourth in a series of high-resolution Earth-imaging satellites Saturday, expanding an orbiting fleet of reconnaissance craft that likely serve the Chinese military.

The next flight of China’s heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket will debut a new configuration designed to launch modules for a Chinese space station. But a demonstration launch of the Long March 5B booster scheduled as soon as April will instead carry a prototype of China’s next-generation deep space crew capsule into orbit on an unpiloted test flight.

Launch of Falcon 9 from the Turn Basin at the NASA-KSC Press Site.