We have liftoff! At 5:07 a.m. EST, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket powered off the launch pad from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A in Florida, carrying the Dragon spacecraft on the company’s 24th commercial resupply services mission for NASA.
Slated to dock with the International Space Station in a little less than 24 hours from now, Dragon will deliver more than 6,500 pounds of science and research experiments, crew supplies, and vehicle hardware to the orbiting laboratory.
Coming up in about a minute, the rocket will pass through Max Q – the moment of peak mechanical stress on the rocket. Then, the Falcon 9’s first and second stage will separate.