Photos: Delta 4 lights up the sky for night owl launch

SpaceX’s first full-size stainless steel Starship test vehicle stands some 164 feet tall and measures wider than the cabin of a Boeing 747 jumbo jet. If Elon Musk has his way, it will fly to an altitude of 65,000 feet before the end of the year.

Chinese rockets performed two satellite delivery missions in a three-hour span Wednesday, carrying a commercial Earth-imaging satellite and five mysterious surveillance payloads into orbit.

An experiment-carrying, reusable mini space shuttle operated by the U.S. Air Force will be boosted into Earth orbit Wednesday atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket.