Photos: California’s predawn liftoff of Atlas 5 rocket

Rocket Lab’s Electron launcher delivered two all-weather radar Earth observation satellites into orbit for Capella Space Thursday night after liftoff from Wallops Island, Virginia, successfully completing the company’s second flight from the U.S. spaceport.

The first Soyuz launch from Kazakhstan carrying a full load of more than 30 Florida-built satellites for OneWeb’s broadband Internet network has slipped from December to mid-to-late January, OneWeb officials said.

Three new crew members embarked on a six-month expedition aboard the International Space Station Thursday with a launch from Kazakhstan on top of a Russian Soyuz rocket at 0805 GMT (4:05 a.m. EDT). NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and crewmates Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner docked with the space station at 1413 GMT (10:13 a.m. EDT) Thursday.