Falcon 9’s launch failure viewed from KSC press site

A communications satellite for Turkmenistan soared into orbit Monday, climbing through gloomy skies over Cape Canaveral aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket to give the Central Asian nation its first foothold in space.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral’s Complex 40 launch pad Tuesday at 12:33 a.m. EST (0533 GMT) with Hispasat 30W-6, a communications satellite to relay video and broadband signals between the Americas, Europe and North Africa.

A previously-flown SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket booster conducted a test-firing Monday at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, ahead of a planned launch Oct. 7 with an Airbus-built communications satellite made for SES and EchoStar.