Photos: Atlas 5 on the pad for X-37B launch

The U.S. Navy’s Mobile User Objective System communications satellite No. 5 was encapsulated in the payload fairing at Astrotech on June 4 and then hoisted atop the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket at Complex 41 on June 13.

Tucked inside a shipping crate aboard an Air Force C-5 transport aircraft, the Navy’s next mobile communications satellite has flown from California to Florida in preparation for liftoff this summer.

The United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket blasted off Thursday night with NASA’s Magnetospheric Multiscale satellite quartet in a successful flight from Cape Canaveral.