CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket carrying a commercial communications satellite into orbit early Monday morning.
SpaceX had aborted the launch twice. The rocket was originally slated to launch Thursday and was rescheduled to Friday, but SpaceX aborted the launch again to run additional tests on the rocket’s second stage, according to a tweet.
According to the SES website, the communications satellite will be part of a network that increases "data connectivity services in the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region, including rapidly growing markets such as India and Indonesia."
German company Airbus Defense and Space manufactured the communications satellite, according to the SES website.
SpaceX conducted a static fire test of the rocket on the pad last week.
The launch window, which started just after midnight Monday morning, was four hours long. The launch of the SES-12 communications satellite was from Pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.