Live coverage: Four astronauts return home after 167 days in space

Boeing said Tuesday it is “making excellent progress” toward launching a second unpiloted test flight of its Starliner crew capsule to the International Space Station by the end of this year or in early January, setting the stage for the first Starliner demonstration mission with astronauts in mid-2021.

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, veteran of a 168-day stay in space in 2017-18, will join two Russian cosmonauts aboard a Soyuz spacecraft April 9 for a flight back to the International Space Station in a deal brokered through Houston-based Axiom Space, NASA and the Russian space agency announced Tuesday.

Miss Monday night’s launch from Kennedy Space Center? Watch a replay of the Falcon 9 rocket taking off with the Inmarsat 5 F4 communications satellite, a heavyweight spacecraft designed to link airliners, ships and others on-the-go via broadband.