After a brief delay Atlas V launched, taking a new military satellite with it.
The rocket was supposed to open with the launch window at 7:43 p.m. The new launch time was 8:04 p.m.
The rocket is carrying a next-generation satellite designed to improve communications for U.S. ground forces around the globe, called the Mobile User Objective System, or MUOS for short.
It will provide 10 times more capability than current systems in use, including voice, video and data.
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The satellite for the U.S. Navy will join two previous upgraded ones launched in 2012 and 2013.
This is the first of 10 launches that ULA has planned from the Space Coast this year.
Tuesday Lockheed Martin employees visited with some 250 eighth grade students at Ronald McNair Magnet Middle School in Rockledge to talk about the mission -- and the technology behind it.
They are working to foster the kids' interests in pursing STEM education and careers.
They worked on different problem solving projects and team communication skills -- all key to any workplace -- including missions to space. And from what we saw -- there are definitely some future engineers in this group, like eighth grader Anaya Rhodes of Viera.
Seven McNair faculty members attended the launch. They are the ones teaching the kids about 'space', which is part of the eighth grade curriculum.
Lockheed Martin invests more than $25 million each year to nonprofits focused on STEM education.