Launch Photos: Orbital ATK's Upgraded Antares Rocket Returns to Flight

Loaded with cargo

Orbital ATK

The Cygnus spacecraft is loaded up with cargo in the Horizontal Integration Facility at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. It will bring 5,290 lbs. (2,400 kg) of supplies and science experiments to the International Space Station.

Integrating the Launch Vehicle

NASA Wallops/Keith Koehler

Integration of the Orbital ATK Antares launch vehicle continues in the NASA Horizontal Integration Facility at the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia for its flight to the International Space Station.

Antares has left the building!

NASA/Bill Ingalls

Orbital ATK's Antares rocket, with the Cygnus spacecraft onboard, rolls out of the Horizontal Integration Facility at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Thursday (Oct. 13), beginning its half-mile journey to the launch pad.

Rocket rollout

NASA/Bill Ingalls

The Orbital ATK Antares rocket carrying the Cygnus cargo ship rolls out to its Pad-0A launchpad at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia for the Oct. 16, 2016 launch of more than 2 tons of NASA cargo to the International Space Station.

Antares on the rise

NASA/Bill Ingalls

With Cygnus onboard, the Antares rocket is raised into the vertical position on launch Pad-0A at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Friday, Oct. 14.

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Hanneke Weitering
Contributing expert

Hanneke Weitering is a multimedia journalist in the Pacific Northwest reporting on the future of aviation at FutureFlight.aero and Aviation International News and was previously the Editor for Spaceflight and Astronomy news here at Space.com. As an editor with over 10 years of experience in science journalism she has previously written for Scholastic Classroom Magazines, MedPage Today and The Joint Institute for Computational Sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. After studying physics at the University of Tennessee in her hometown of Knoxville, she earned her graduate degree in Science, Health and Environmental Reporting (SHERP) from New York University. Hanneke joined the Space.com team in 2016 as a staff writer and producer, covering topics including spaceflight and astronomy. She currently lives in Seattle, home of the Space Needle, with her cat and two snakes. In her spare time, Hanneke enjoys exploring the Rocky Mountains, basking in nature and looking for dark skies to gaze at the cosmos.