A Space X Falcon9 rocket is readied for launch Friday, February 17, 2017 on launch pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The launch scheduled for Saturday to the International Space Station will be the first launch from the historic re-fitted launch pad since Space Shuttle Atlantis in 2011. (Red Huber/Staff Photographer) ** LEESBURG OUT, LADY LAKE OUT , DAYTONA BEACH NEWS JOURNAL OUT , TV OUT, MAGS OUT, NO SALES **
A Space X Falcon9 rocket is readied for launch Friday, February 17, 2017 on launch pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The launch scheduled for Saturday to the International Space Station will be the first launch from the historic re-fitted launch pad since Space Shuttle Atlantis in 2011. (Red Huber/Staff Photographer) ** LEESBURG OUT, LADY LAKE OUT , DAYTONA BEACH NEWS JOURNAL OUT , TV OUT, MAGS OUT, NO SALES ** Credit: ap photograph

Cape Canaveral, Fla. — For decades it has stood like a skyscraper on the Florida coast, its spire stretching more than 400 feet high. The kings and queens of the cosmos — astronauts from Apollo and the shuttle eras, including Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins — have zipped to the top of its tower in an elevator to get one last view of the waves lapping the Florida coast before launching violently into space.

But then in 2011, when the space shuttle was retired, and NASA could no longer fly humans into space, NASA’s Launch Complex 39A went dormant, a symbol of a once-great era rusting away in the salt air.

Now the venerable site is about to come back to life. If all goes according to plan, SpaceX, the commercial space venture founded by Elon Musk, plans to launch a Falcon 9 rocket from the pad this morning, the first since the shuttle era.

While SpaceX has plans to eventually fly NASA astronauts from 39A, Saturday’s launch will have no passengers, and instead carry 5,500 pounds of cargo and experiments for the International Space Station.

The pad hosted six of the Apollo lunar launches, including Apollo 11, the first mission to land humans on the moon. And it also was the stage for many shuttle missions, earning it a place on the National Register of Historic Places.

In an interview last year, Musk said he was grateful to be able to lease the site from NASA.

“I think it’s a great honor, and I have incredible respect for the hallowed ground that it is,” he said. “I would have never imagined that we would have the same opportunity to launch from the same launch pad as Apollo 11.”

The resurrection of 39A, which SpaceX has spent years renovating, is yet another step in the transformation of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center into what officials here call a “multi-user space port.” NASA and the Air Force, which operates the adjacent Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, have leased out large swaths of the area to commercial companies that are taking over roles that traditionally were the exclusive domain of the government.