Falcon 9 goes upright after sunrise in time-lapse video

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 booster accomplished a delicate maneuver after a glowing predawn launch from Cape Canaveral on Saturday, autonomously navigating its away to a modified barge the size of a football field hidden in darkness beneath a blanket of low clouds, before it crashed and broke apart.

Follow the key events of the Falcon 9 rocket’s ascent to orbit with the first 10 next-generation satellites for Iridium’s voice and data relay fleet.

Aiming for reusability, Rocket Lab has demonstrated the mid-air recovery of a booster test article in a key test before rigging the first stage of the company’s Electron launcher with a parachute on missions beginning later this year.