Video: OA-7 Cygnus freighter departs International Space Station

Headed to a relic from the solar system’s formation over four billion years ago, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx sample return craft was moved to Cape Canaveral’s Complex 41 launch pad today in preparation for liftoff Thursday aboard an Atlas 5 rocket en route to Asteroid Bennu hoping to find the seeds of life.

A three-man crew from Russia, the United States and Italy climbed inside a Soyuz spacecraft and rocketed into orbit Saturday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on course for the International Space Station.

Isolated camera views from various locations around Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center show the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket lifting off with NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite-M.