Blastoff! ULAs Vulcan rocket launches moon lander on first mission

The Vulcan Centaur rocket launched from ULA’s Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida at 2:18 a.m. EST (0718 GMT) on its Cert-1 mission to prove its readiness for commercial and government flights. Full Story: The rocket is also carrying the Peregrine moon lander, a private mission built by the U.S. company Astrobotic that is carrying six experiments for NASA as the first flight of the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program. The mission will attempt the first U.S. moon landing since Apollo 17 in 1972, and will be the first private mission ever to land on the moon safely, if successful. Broadcast courtesy: NASA