Live coverage: Space station crew safely returns to Earth

Space station commander Scott Kelly and newly-arrived flight engineer Tim Kopra ventured outside the lab complex Monday and freed up a stalled robot arm-carrying transporter so it could be moved to a nearby anchor point and locked down, clearing the way for a Russian Progress supply ship to dock Wednesday.

SpaceX completed Friday the last drop test of the Dragon crew capsule’s parachutes before the first launch of astronauts on the human-rated ship May 27, while technicians at Cape Canaveral have mated the spacecraft’s crew module with its unpressurized trunk section.

A series of achievements in China’s space program over the last 12 months have set the stage to start construction of the country’s first space station in 2019, a year later than previously scheduled, officials said Friday.