On its second attempt, SpaceX sends Dragon soaring to the ISS [Updated]

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  Launch of the Falcon 9 rocket Thursday was a pretty thing, [credit: SpaceX webcast ]

12:45pm ET Thursday Update: A Falcon 9 rocket launched on Thursday from Florida, delivering its Dragon spacecraft into orbit. The first stage then made a safe landing on a drone ship stationed in the Atlantic Ocean. The company's webcast ended without any coverage of the second stage's six-hour coast to demonstrate a capability for an unnamed customer.

This was the tenth Falcon 9 launch of 2019. Overall the rocket has now launched 76 times. Sometime in 2020, among rockets in active service, the Falcon 9 will almost certainly become the U.S. booster with the most launch experience, surpassing the Atlas V. That rocket has launched 80 times, with one more mission scheduled for later this month-a test flight of Boeing's Starliner spacecraft.

Original post: At Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Thursday morning, the countdown clock is again ticking toward a launch of the Falcon 9 rocket.

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