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

A Russian Soyuz rocket lifted off from the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East on Thursday carrying 28 satellites, including a pair of Russian mapping satellites, secondary payloads from Germany, Japan, Spain, South Africa, and a dozen Earth-observing CubeSats and eight commercial weather payloads for Planet and Spire.

Astrobotic, a Pittsburgh-based company developing a robotic lunar lander, will launch its first moon mission under contract to NASA on the debut flight of United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur rocket in 2021, officials announced Monday.

Relativity Space says it has secured $140 million in new funding from venture capital firms and private investors, enough to carry the company’s 3D-printed small satellite launcher through its first orbital flight from Cape Canaveral in early 2021.