Live coverage: Dragon cargo craft arrives at space station

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch an Intelsat communications satellite with a NASA-funded air pollution monitor to be positioned over the Americas in 2022, officials announced Tuesday.

The NROL-72 mission was the 13th to date supporting what the NRO calls its “proliferated architecture” satellite constellation. Liftoff of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket from pad 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base happened at 7:13:50 p.m. PDT (10:13:50 p.m. EDT / 0213:50 UTC).

Veteran astronauts Soichi Noguchi and Shannon Walker have been assigned to fly to the International Space Station on SpaceX’s second piloted Crew Dragon mission later this year, joining commander Mike Hopkins and astronaut Victor Glover on a planned six-month expedition in orbit.