Live coverage: SpaceX launches another batch of Starlink satellites

A Spanish Earth observation spacecraft and a French research satellite to probe luminous phenomena above thunderstorms are packaged inside the nose cone of an Italian-built Vega rocket for launch Monday night from French Guiana.

Sierra Nevada and United Launch Alliance have announced the most powerful version of the Atlas 5 rocket, with five strap-on boosters and a twin-engine upper stage, will send the first two Dream Chaser cargo missions to the International Space Station from Cape Canaveral in 2020 and 2021, a schedule that still must be confirmed by NASA.

SpaceX started the week with the launch of a Falcon 9 rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida just after sunrise Monday, delivering a classified U.S. government spy satellite to orbit as the booster’s first stage returned to Cape Canaveral for a vertical landing.