Shuttle Atlantis unwrapped ahead of public debut

Watch a time lapse replay of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket as it was raised upright at launch pad 39A in Florida on Saturday, a day before its scheduled launch with a top secret payload for the U.S. government’s spy satellite agency.

SpaceX test-fired a Falcon 9 rocket Monday night at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, clearing the way for a launch Thursday with Qatar’s Es’hail 2 communications satellite, the first daytime liftoff from Florida’s Space Coast in more than six months.

A Crew Dragon capsule ferried four astronauts into space Sunday night after a rumbling departure from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, setting off on a 27-hour pursuit of the International Space Station on SpaceX’s first operational crew rotation flight to the orbiting outpost.