Update: Northrop Grumman successfully air-launches its Pegasus XL rocket at 10 p.m. Thursday night, sending NASA's ICON spacecraft to orbit.

Update: Weather delays Pegasus launch. Next attempt set for 9:30 p.m. Thursday.

After over a month of waiting, the Space Coast is set to resume having rocket launches once again.

On Wednesday, Northrop Grumman will attempt to air-launch its Pegasus XL rocket that will send NASA's $252 million Ionospheric Connection Explorer science mission, or ICON spacecraft to study the region of near-Earth space, called the ionosphere.

Beginning at 9:25 p.m., ICON and Pegasus will take off aboard Grumman's L-1011 Stargazer aircraft from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station and air-launch the spacecraft over the Atlantic Ocean at 9:30 p.m., according to NASA's press release. The launch window lasts 90 minutes.

A first attempt had been made last November but teams were forced to scrub due to technical issues. Last month, NASA said, "the cause of the issue is understood, and the flight hardware has been modified to address the issue," but did not state what the issue had been.

The last time residents were graced with a rocket blasting off from the Cape was at the end of August with United Launch Alliance's Delta IV medium-class rocket. It marked the last time a 'single-stick' version of a Delta IV rocket would ever launch again.

But even though the brief launch drought is set to end, Wednesday's launch will be different than most. Instead of seeing a vertical rocket take flight from one of the launch pads at the Air Force Station or Kennedy Space Center, Grumman's Pegasus rocket will not launch from the ground, but from the air.

The Stargazer aircraft will release the rocket and the spacecraft about 100 miles off the coast of Daytona Beach where Pegasus will proceed to launch the ICON spacecraft at an altitude of 39,000 feet. That means the only place to view the launch will be on NASA TV.

Yet as of Monday, weather is currently only 40% "go" for launch. "Primary concerns are cumulus clouds and lightning," according to NASA.

Having air-launches isn't something new, though. Since 1990, Grumman has been air-launching its Pegasus rockets. The last time one was launched, however, was in December 2016 for NASA's Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System, or CYGNSS mission.

For this mission, NASA hopes to understand how the gasses in the ionosphere, "the area through which radio communications and GPS signals travel," affects our own technology and communications systems, according to the space agency.

The agency will provide live coverage of the launch, available on NASA TV, beginning at 9:15 p.m.

Contact Jaramillo at 321-242-3668 or antoniaj@floridatoday.com. Follow her on Twitter at @AntoniaJ_11.