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

NASA civil servants and the agency’s contractor work force are bracing for high winds and rain from Hurricane Dorian, securing rocket stages, spacecraft assembly areas and even hauling a 6.7-million-pound mobile launch tower, designed for the huge rocket being built for the Artemis moon program, back to the cavernous Vehicle Assembly Building for safekeeping.

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.

Narrated video packages show the shrouded NROL-37 payload being hoisted atop the United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket and the retraction of the mobile service gantry.