Q&A with Elon Musk, SpaceX’s founder and CEO

Built for hauling rockets aloft to launch satellites, the world’s biggest airplane landed Saturday after a widely-anticipated test flight over California’s Mojave Desert, six months after the death of billionaire benefactor Paul Allen clouded the future of the project.

The acquisition of DigitalGlobe, the owner of several commercial Earth-viewing spacecraft in orbit, by Canada’s MDA Corp. will combine two of the world’s leading radar and optical observation imaging systems into one globe-spanning network and give Space Systems/Loral a firmer foothold in the market for manufacturing Earth observation satellites, officials said Friday.

SpaceX ground crews transferred a Falcon 9 rocket to its seaside launch mount at Cape Canaveral on Sunday evening in preparation for liftoff Monday with Turkmenistan’s first satellite.