Live coverage: Soyuz crew lands in Kazakhstan

SpaceX ran a Falcon 9 rocket through a customary preflight checkout Tuesday, filling it with super-cold propellants and firing its nine Merlin first stage engines in preparation for liftoff Friday on a resupply run to the International Space Station.

A powerful Russian Proton booster launched from Kazakhstan at 0931:42 GMT (5:31:42 a.m. EDT) Monday with the first part of a multibillion-dollar Mars mission led by the European Space Agency. An upper stage engine fired four times over 10 hours to send the Mars orbiter and lander away from Earth.

NASA said Saturday that the launch of four astronauts on SpaceX’s first operational Crew Dragon mission to the International Space Station has been delayed from Oct. 31 until “no sooner than early-to-mid November,” allowing time for SpaceX to resolve an issue with Falcon 9 rocket engines that halted a recent launch attempt with a GPS navigation satellite.