Orbital ATK returned to flight Monday evening by christening a refurbished Virginia launchpad with a smooth rocket liftoff two years after an explosion caused 15 million in damage. Flying an updated Antares rocket with new engines, the company sent its unmanned Cygnus spacecraft into orbit at 7:45 p.m., chasing down the International Space Station on a cargo resupply mission for NASA. The spacecraft is scheduled to reach the station Sunday to deliver 5,100 pounds of cargo and supplies to the astronauts there. The highly-anticipated launch, visible across much of the Mid-Atlantic, was full of drama and tension for Dulles-based Orbital ATK, which lost another unmanned Antares in a massive fireball two years ago. The problem then was with the rocket's engines--prompting the switch to the Russian-made RD-181.

Two years after an anomaly caused one of its rockets to explode just seconds after liftoff, the American spaceflight company Orbital ATK is ready to launch another cargo resupply vehicle to the International Space Station. At 8:03 p.m. EDT on Sunday, an Antares rocket carrying a fully-stocked Cygnus spacecraft will lift off from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in eastern Virginia. "After being launched into low-Earth orbit, the Cygnus spacecraft will use its advanced maneuvering capability to transport the cargo from a low parking orbit to the space station, where it will be grappled by the crew using the station's robotic arm and berthed to the space station," the company explained in a statement released Saturday. "After the cargo is removed and disposal items are loaded, Cygnus will depart from the station in mid-November." Among the payloads the Cygnus spacecraft is carrying is an experiment named Spacecraft Fire Experiment-II, or Saffire-II.

United Launch Alliance launched an Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral that is headed towards the International Space Station. An Atlas V rocket launch carrying a Cygnus spacecraft bound for the International Space Station lifts off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on March 22, 2016. CAPE CANAVERAL -- An unmanned Cygnus supply ship is headed for a Saturday morning rendezvous with the International Space Station after an 11:05 p.m. ET Tuesday blastoff from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station aboard an Atlas V rocket. The 194-foot United Launch Alliance rocket blazed into a night sky brightened by a nearly full moon, carrying the Orbital ATK Cygnus packed with 7,500 pounds of food, equipment and science experiments. "These resupply missions are critical," Kenny Todd, NASA's space station operations integration manager, said before the launch.