Live coverage: Space station crew safely returns to Earth

Rocket Lab’s second launch in a little more than a week blasted off from New Zealand at 5:14 a.m. EDT (0914 UTC) Friday with two commercial Earth observation satellites for BlackSky. The Electron rocket’s first stage booster successfully splashed down in the Pacific Ocean for recovery.

NASA awarded a $73.7 million contract Friday to the California-based startup Made in Space for a 3D-printing demonstration using a free-flying small satellite to additively manufacture solar array beams in space.

NASA and Houston-based Axiom Space have signed a “mission order” setting the stage for four civilians to visit to the International Space Station early next year, the first fully commercial flight to the orbiting lab complex, agency managers said Monday.