The Centaur carrying NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter hurtles off Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Trailing a column of fire, the Atlas V/Centaur carrying NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, and NASA's Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, known as LCROSS, hurtles off Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. LRO and LCROSS are the first missions in NASA's plan to return humans to the moon and begin establishing a lunar outpost by 2020. The LRO also includes seven instruments that will help NASA characterize the moon's surface: DIVINER, LAMP, LEND, LOLA , CRATER, Mini-RF and LROC. Launch was on-time at 5:32 p.m. EDT. Photo credit: NASA/Tom Farrar, Kevin O'Connell