Live coverage: Kennedy Space Center to reopen Friday

Rocket Lab successfully launched five small satellites from New Zealand Saturday for customers in the United States and Australia, including a CubeSat with a novel swarm of tiny magnetometers to measure the plasma currents that shape colorful auroras.

A Russian Soyuz rocket lifted off Friday night from a tropical spaceport in French Guiana with a commercial communications satellite setting off on a dual mission to demonstrate new space technologies and bridge the Atlantic with data, video and voice relays. Launch occurred at 0103:34 GMT Saturday (8:03:34 p.m. EST Friday).

The change was confirmed by the agency a week after a New Glenn testing explosion destroyed the rocket and damaged Launch Complex 36.