Live coverage: Atlas 5 countdown and launch journal

With the Delta 4 rocket now waiting on the launch pad, its Air Force Wideband Global SATCOM communications satellite payload has jetted from the Los Angeles factory to the Cape Canaveral in preparation for liftoff this summer.

More than three weeks after a faulty electrical component halted a countdown moments before liftoff, an Ariane 5 rocket lifted off from French Guiana on Friday with two commercial communications satellites. Launch occurred at 2156 GMT (5:56 p.m. EDT).

Indian ground teams lost contact with a robotic lunar lander and rover minutes before their scheduled touchdown near the moon’s south pole. India was attempting to become the fourth country to achieve a soft landing on the moon.