NASA's newest space telescope launches on a quest to explore the hidden universe

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (AP) - NASA's newest crown jewel blasted off Sunday to hunt for planets around other stars, explore secret dark energy and survey the cosmos like never before.

SpaceX launched the $4.3 billion Roman Space Telescope shortly after daybreak aboard a triple-the-firepower Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center. Roman blazed toward an observation point 1 million miles away that's home to the Webb Space Telescope, one of NASA's other big-ticket eyes in the sky.

The bus-sized telescope - named after the late Nancy Grace Roman, NASA's first chief astronomer - will take more than three months to reach its destination. Once there, it will cast the widest gaze yet on the hidden parts of the universe from space, uncovering the unimaginable with unsurpassed speed.

"It's going to find thousands of supernovae, tens of thousands of planets, billions of galaxies and tens of billions of stars," NASA said.