Watch replays of the launch and landing of a Falcon 9 rocket carrying a Dragon cargo ship to the International Space Station. The SpaceX commercial launch vehicle lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 10:36am EST (1536 GMT) on December 15, 2017. The rocket’s first stage landed back at the Cape less than eight minutes later.
Two cosmonauts and a NASA astronaut wrapping up a six-month stay aboard the International Space Station readied their Soyuz ferry ship for a fiery plunge back to Earth early Saturday amid preparations in Florida for launch of another station-bound crew Thursday aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft.
SpaceX’s launch team in Cape Canaveral fueled a Falcon 9 rocket with super-chilled liquid propellants and briefly fired the first stage’s nine Merlin engines Monday in a customary preflight test ahead of Wednesday’s scheduled liftoff of a commercial television broadcasting satellite for the Asia-Pacific.
An Ariane 5 rocket launched Tuesday at 2101 GMT (4:01 p.m. EST) from French Guiana with a communications satellite to provide broadband and television services for the government of Saudi Arabia and commercial clients across Europe and the Middle East, and an Indian payload to help bridge the digital divide in South Asia.
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