Photos: More Delta 4 launch shots

A heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket propelled China’s first Mars landing mission toward the Red Planet on Thursday after launching from a seaside spaceport on Hainan Island, the second of three international Mars probes expected to depart planet Earth this month.

Giulio Ranzo is the chief executive of Avio, the Italian company responsible for building the Vega rocket. Ranzo recently spoke with Spaceflight Now about the Vega rocket’s increasing launch rate, the debut of the new Vega C booster in 2020, and future plans to evolve the Vega design to compete with commercial microsatellite launchers.

Two panels of managers and scientists presented details of SpaceX’s 16th operational resupply flight to the International Space Station on the eve of its launch aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral.