Photos: Atlas 5 rocket on the pad with WorldView 4 satellite

Juno left the Earth atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket on Aug. 5, 2011, beginning its journey to Jupiter atop the most powerful Atlas variant with five side-mounted boosters. It arrives at the gas giant on Monday.

JPL chief engineer Rob Manning, a veteran of Mars mission teams dating back to Mars Pathfinder more than two decades ago, describes how the InSight spacecraft will enter the Martian atmosphere and touch down on the red planet.

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket at 5:37 a.m. PDT (8:37 a.m. EDT; 1237 GMT) Monday from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California with the third set of 10 new-generation satellites for Iridium’s voice and data relay network. The Falcon 9’s first stage booster successfully landed on a platform in the Pacific Ocean a few minutes after liftoff.