Live coverage: Veteran three-man crew docks with space station

The first launch from the nearly $3 billion Vostochny Cosmodrome took off Thursday, carrying three satellites into orbit from the new spaceport nestled in Russia’s forested Far East.

South Korea’s Anasis 2 military communications satellite, built in Europe by Airbus, lifted off Monday from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on top of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Launch occurred at 5:30 p.m. EDT (2130 GMT).

SpaceX launched the next group of satellites for the company’s Starlink broadband network Wednesday at 9:25 p.m. EDT (0125 GMT Thursday) from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The satellites rode into orbit on a Falcon 9 rocket with a first stage flown on four previous missions, and the booster made a successful fifth landing on a SpaceX drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean.