Live coverage: Mission control loses contact with Indian moon lander

More than three weeks after a faulty electrical component halted a countdown moments before liftoff, an Ariane 5 rocket lifted off from French Guiana on Friday with two commercial communications satellites. Launch occurred at 2156 GMT (5:56 p.m. EDT).

JPL chief engineer Rob Manning, a veteran of Mars mission teams dating back to Mars Pathfinder more than two decades ago, describes how the InSight spacecraft will enter the Martian atmosphere and touch down on the red planet.

Japan’s Hayabusa 2 spacecraft briefly landed on an asteroid Thursday more than 200 million miles from Earth and fired a bullet to scoop up a rocky sample, successfully accomplishing one of the mission’s most challenging maneuvers before returning the asteroid specimen to scientists on the ground in December 2020.