Live views of launch pad 39A (members only)

Elon Musk’s space transport company — chartered with a long-term goal of colonizing Mars — plans to send the first commercial mission to the red planet as soon as 2018, SpaceX announced Wednesday.

The mission features orbital transfer vehicles that are carrying 30 of the payloads with 14 being deployed after the initial mission launch. Liftoff from pad 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base happened at 10:49 a.m. PST (1:49 p.m. EST, 1849 UTC).

China’s second space launch of the year released four satellites into orbits more than 300 miles in altitude, adding two spacecraft to the Chinese-owned Jilin 1 commercial Earth-imaging constellation and deploying two smallsats on tech demo missions.