Stats: Delta 4 history and manifest

A NASA official said Friday that SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft could be ready to ferry astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the International Space Station as soon as early March, pending the results from a major demonstration of the ship’s launch abort system this weekend, a pair of parachute drop tests, and space station crew schedules.

Watch as Russian cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin and NASA astronaut Nick Hague launch aboard a Soyuz rocket bound for the International Space Station but a Soyuz booster failure cut short their ascent into orbit.

A top secret surveillance payload owned by the National Reconnaissance Office soared into space Saturday from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on top of a United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket, entering an unusual orbit not previously used by the U.S. government’s spy satellite fleet.