Live coverage: Fresh crew docks at space station

The 32-story-tall mobile service tower at the Delta 4’s launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California was retracted away from the rocket Thursday in advance of a planned liftoff with a top secret National Reconnaissance Office payload.

Leaving crewmate Peggy Whitson behind in orbit for an extended mission, a Russian cosmonaut and his French co-pilot undocked from the International Space Station early Friday and plunged back to Earth, landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan to close out a 196-day mission.

SpaceX test-fired its next Falcon 9 rocket at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on Saturday in preparation for the company’s 17th launch of the year, a mission tentatively set for liftoff Wednesday with a secretive payload named Zuma for the U.S. government.