Live coverage: 400th Proton rocket takes off with Russian satellite

A Russian Soyuz rocket made a railroad journey Wednesday to its launch pad in Kazakhstan, two days before blastoff with a crew of three spaceflight veterans from the United States, Italy and Russia heading for the International Space Station.

Tugged along a historic route leading to the launch pad where Yuri Gagarin took off 1961 to become the first person in space, a Soyuz rocket rolled out of its assembly hangar in Kazakhstan and stood up on its launch mount Sunday.

A Vega rocket launched from French Guiana at 0149:24 GMT Tuesday (8:49:24 p.m. EST Monday) with Europe’s fifth Sentinel environmental satellite. The Sentinel 2B observatory will take the pulse of Earth’s vegetation, monitoring crops, forests, urban sprawl, and pollution from polar orbit.