Mission Reports

Photos: Soyuz soars skyward from French Guiana

Flying for the 10th time from a tropical launch facility along the South American coastline, a Russian Soyuz rocket lifted off Dec. 18 and streaked through partly sunny skies with four satellites to extend the reach of the O3b Networks, a company founded to bring broadband to the world’s most remote and impoverished countries.

Delta 4

Orion is back home

Completing a 2,700-mile journey across the United States, America’s inaugural Orion spaceship arrived back home at the Kennedy Space Center on Thursday, just under two weeks after its trial by fire.