Tag: Reusability
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Photos: Falcon 9 rocket poised for first national security flight
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is being readied for launch with a classified payload for the National Reconnaissance Office early Sunday, the commercial launcher’s 33rd overall flight, and first dedicated to a U.S. government national security mission. The two-stage rocket stood vertical on launch pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on Saturday evening as…
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Photos: Falcon 9 rocket poised for first national security flight
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is being readied for launch with a classified payload for the National Reconnaissance Office early Sunday, the commercial launcher’s 33rd overall flight, and first dedicated to a U.S. government national security mission. The two-stage rocket stood vertical on launch pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on Saturday evening as…
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Falcon 9 rocket rolled to launch pad with classified payload
The Falcon 9 rocket slated to launch on SpaceX’s first national security mission is seen on launch pad 39A on Saturday morning. Credit: Spaceflight Now Working overnight on Florida’s Space Coast, SpaceX technicians transferred a two-stage Falcon 9 rocket from the company’s commercial hangar a quarter-mile up the ramp to launch pad 39A early Saturday,…
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Weather looks good for Falcon 9 launch Sunday, but payload still a mystery
The National Reconnaissance Office has released its mission patch for Sunday’s launch. The NROL-76 mission patch “depicts Lewis and Clark heading into the great unknown to discover and explore the newly purchased Louisiana Territory,” the NRO said. Credit: NRO An official weather outlook issued by U.S. Air Force meteorologists Thursday calls for partly cloudy skies…
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SpaceX completes static fire test for Sunday launch of secret satellite
Nine Merlin engines at the base of SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 rocket fired up Tuesday on a launch pad in Florida, wringing out the booster and ground systems ahead of a planned liftoff Sunday with a top secret payload for the U.S. government’s spy satellite agency. The computer-controlled countdown sequencer oversaw filling of the two-stage…
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Musk wants to make Falcon rockets fully reusable
This illustration of a Falcon 9 rocket’s upper stage re-entering the atmosphere is part of an animation released in 2011. SpaceX officials have not discussed technical details of how the company would recover upper stages under founder Elon Musk’s latest emphasis on the project. Credit: SpaceX SpaceX chief Elon Musk said last week he is…
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Blue Origin’s staying power bankrolled by Jeff Bezos’s multibillion-dollar investment
Jeff Bezos speaks at the 33rd Space Symposium on April 5. Credit: Stephen Clark/Spaceflight Now Amazon.com’s Jeff Bezos, now the second-richest person in the world, is funding his space company’s lofty ambitions $1 billion per year, driving Blue Origin closer to taking paying passengers to the edge of space and fielding a reusable satellite launcher…
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Photos: SpaceX booster lands for second time on drone ship
SpaceX’s reused Falcon 9 first stage booster returned to a landing on an ocean-going platform a few minutes after launching March 30 with the SES 10 communications satellite, then returned to Port Canaveral early Tuesday. Standing more than 150 feet (nearly 50 meters) tall, the booster sailed into port around sunrise Tuesday after riding SpaceX’s…
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SpaceX opens new era for spaceflight with successful core stage reuse
For SpaceX and its founder Elon Musk, it was a day 15 years in the making. The accomplishment Thursday evening of launching a flight-proven Falcon 9 core stage and landing it yet again on the ASDS barge, Of Course I Still Love You, is a stunning and beautiful feat of engineering that opens the door…
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Watch a replay of the Falcon 9 engine test
The Falcon 9 rocket’s main engines briefly ignited at launch pad 39A in a standard pre-launch test. This is the second time this booster has test fired its engines on a launch pad at Cape Canaveral. The first stage first fired at launch complex 40 prior to the CRS-8 space station resupply mission in April…