Live coverage: Atlas 5 countdown and launch journal

Air Force meteorologists are giving favorable weather odds for the Delta 4 rocket to launch a pair of space surveillance satellites early Friday morning from Cape Canaveral.

The 200th Atlas-Centaur rocket, history some 52 years in the making, will blast off Tuesday from Cape Canaveral to deliver a U.S. Navy mobile communications satellite into orbit.

The U.S. Air Force has identified the launch of a next-generation GPS navigation satellite for the first in a series of competitive rocket procurements between United Launch Alliance and SpaceX, service officials announced Wednesday.