SpaceX is about to launch one of its hardest missions yet - here's how to watch live

AFP

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SpaceX is at it again.

After boats, high winds, and fuel issues led the company to scrub four launches in the past nine days, SpaceX is ready to try a fifth attempt at firing one of its upgraded Falcon 9 rockets into space.

The launch is scheduled to take place on Friday evening out of SpaceX's launch site at Cape Canaveral, Florida. The launch window opens at 6:35 p.m. EST and ends at 8:06 p.m.

SpaceX's main mission is to ferry the Boeing-built SES-9 communications satellite to about 22,000 miles above sea level.

Weighing in at approximately 11,750 pounds, the SES-9 satellite will be the largest payload yet that SpaceX has launched to such great heights.

Consequently, this will be one of SpaceX's most difficult missions to date.

While the main mission is what SpaceX is getting paid for, it's the secondary goal that makes this launch so special.

The company will attempt to retrieve the first stage of its rocket after launch by landing it on an ocean platform floating about 400 miles off Florida's coast.

Because this mission is particularly strenuous on the Falcon 9, SpaceX said that it has low hopes for a successful rocket landing.

But if somehow the rocket succeeds, it will be the second time in history that SpaceX will have landed one of its rockets and the first time a landing will have occurred on its ocean platform.

Live coverage of the event will take place shortly before 6:35 p.m. EST, and you can watch it on YouTube or below. Read on for a complete breakdown of what's scheduled to take place with the rocket after liftoff.

Here's a schedule of the sequence of events after takeoff, courtesy of SpaceX:

• 00:02:36 - first-stage engine shutdown/main-engine cutoff
• 00:02:40 - first and second stages separate
• 00:02:47 - second-stage engine starts
• 00:03:42 - fairing deployment
• 00:09:01 - second-stage engine cutoff
• 00:27:07 - second-stage engine restarts
• 00:27:55 - second-stage engine cutoff
• 00:31:24 - SES-9 satellite deployed

After the first and second stages separate at 2 minutes 40 seconds after liftoff, the first stage will begin its way back to Earth for an attempted landing.