Watch live as NASA announces astronaut crews for new U.S. spacecraft

Hardware problems that cropped up earlier this month on the Hubble Space Telescope, now approaching the 31st anniversary of its launch, are the latest signs the observatory is showing its age.

A Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo freighter departed the International Space Station Wednesday after delivering more than 7,800 pounds of equipment and experiments, heading for an extended mission with payloads to study fire behavior in microgravity and test a next-generation radio system.

Spaceflight Now Members can watch a time-lapse replay of the Atlas 5 rocket’s rollout to pad 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station before the launch of the U.S. Air Force’s AEHF 5 communications satellite.