Tag: Ball Aerospace
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NASA’s first interplanetary smallsats may struggle to stay under cost caps
Artist’s concept of the Janus mission imaging a binary asteroid. Credit: NASA The first set of proposals for a new class of small robotic probes NASA wants to dispatch across the solar system came in with higher cost estimates than agency officials expected, a NASA manager said Sunday. NASA selected three finalist mission concepts in…
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SpaceX wins NASA contract to launch X-ray telescope on reused rocket
File photo of a Falcon 9 launch from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: SpaceX NASA has selected a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket — flying with a reused first stage booster — to launch the Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer mission from pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida in…
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Newly-released videos show SpaceX payload fairing coming back to Earth
New videos released Wednesday by SpaceX show the payload fairing from the company’s Falcon Heavy rocket plunging back into the atmosphere after launch June 25, trailing a wake of haunting blue super-heated plasma before unfurling a parafoil and landing in the net of an offshore recovery ship. In one of the videos, tweeted by SpaceX,…
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More photos from SpaceX’s first Falcon Heavy night launch
The predawn launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center of a Falcon Heavy rocket June 25 was the first nighttime liftoff of SpaceX’s heavy-lifter, the most powerful launcher currently operational anywhere in the world. The Falcon Heavy lifted off from pad 39A at 2:30 a.m. EDT (0630 GMT) with two dozen research, technology demonstration and weather…
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Photos: Falcon Heavy lights up Florida’s Space Coast
The world’s most powerful operational rocket flashed to life at 2:30 a.m. EDT (0630 GMT) Tuesday and climbed into a moonlit summer sky from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the same site where the Apollo 11 astronauts left Earth for their historic moon landing nearly 50 years ago. The Falcon Heavy…
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Watch a video replay of the Falcon Heavy’s first night launch
This video replay shows the liftoff of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida with 5.1 million pounds of thrust, followed by the nearby landing of the launcher’s twin side boosters nine minutes later. The rocket’s center core missed a landing attempt on SpaceX’s offshore drone ship. The video comes from…
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Falcon Heavy launches on military-led rideshare mission, boat catches fairing
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket took off at 2:30 a.m. EDT (0630 GMT) from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: SpaceX SpaceX’s third Falcon Heavy rocket took off from the Kennedy Space Center in a predawn launch Tuesday, delivering two dozen research and weather observation spacecraft into orbit on a marathon three-and-a-half…
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Launch timeline for Falcon Heavy’s first launch for the U.S. Air Force
SpaceX’s third Falcon Heavy rocket is set for liftoff from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and the heavy-lift launcher will head on an easterly course over the Atlantic Ocean atop more than 5 million pounds of thrust. The 229-foot-tall (70-meter) rocket is poised for launch from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in…
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Photos: Falcon Heavy reaches pad 39A for its first night launch
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket rolled out of its hangar and up the ramp to pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, then was raised vertical at the seaside launch complex early Monday in preparation for a late-night liftoff with two dozen weather observation and technology demonstration satellites. The rocket stands 229 feet (70…
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Live coverage: SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy lifts off from Kennedy Space Center
Live coverage of the countdown and launch of a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from launch pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida with two dozen spacecraft on the U.S. Air Force’s Space Test Program-2 mission. Text updates will appear automatically below. Spaceflight Now Members can watch a live view of the launch pad.…