Photo: Gene Blevins/ReutersPhoto: Gene Blevins/Reuters

A US military weather satellite, refurbished after more than a decade in storage, blasted off aboard an unmanned Atlas 5 rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, on Thursday. The sleek, 58-metre rocket, built by United Launch Alliance, is putting the Defence Meteorological Satellite Programme or DMSP spacecraft into orbit, passing over Earth’s poles.

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