OSIRIS-REx launch as seen from NASA Press Site

The Air Force’s miniature space shuttle and its ride to orbit have been joined together inside an assembly building at Cape Canaveral in preparation for launch May 20.

NASA’s Perseverance rover will depart Cape Canaveral Thursday on a $2.7 billion mission to Mars, carrying with it the first interplanetary aircraft, sophisticated instruments to search for signs of ancient life, and drill to core samples for eventual return to Earth.

Remarkable rocketcam video footage of the Oct. 8 flight a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket from California has been released to show its hitchhiker cubesat payloads shooting into orbit.