Keith's note: After a last second halt in the countdown earlier in the day the Falcon 9 launch vehicle made a perfect climb to orbit at 2:45 pm EDT. All indications are that the vehicle performed flawlessly. So much for the commerical space haters out there - they are eating Falcon feathers right now.

Space X update 4:40 pm EDT: Orbital info: Nominal shutdown and orbit was almost exactly 250km.  Telemetry showed essentially a bullseye: ~0.2% on perigee and ~1% on apogee.