Psyche Live Launch Coverage

A Psyche mission graphic is displayed on the historic countdown clock as the Sun rises at Kennedy Space Center’s NASA News Center in Florida on Monday, Oct. 16, 2023. NASA’s Psyche spacecraft, atop a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, soared into the sky after lifting off from Kennedy’s Launch Complex 39A at 10:19 a.m. EDT Friday, Oct. 13. The Psyche mission will study a metal-rich asteroid with the same name, located in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. This is NASA’s first mission to study an asteroid that has more metal than rock or ice. Riding with Psyche is a pioneering technology demonstration – NASA’s Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) experiment – which will be the first test of laser communications beyond the Moon.