This is our comprehensive fact sheet previewing the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket deployment of the classified NROL-42 payload for the National Reconnaissance Office.

Bulking up NASA’s constellation of tracking stations in the sky that provides critical links between orbiting spacecraft and ground control, a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket successfully deployed a new communications hub in space today.

Scientists eager for answers to long-standing questions about the geology of Mars will get a lift Saturday with the blastoff from California of an Atlas 5 rocket with NASA’s InSight mission, a robotic landing craft that will take the pulse and temperature of the red planet.