Tag: SpaceX
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SpaceX plans to debut Red Dragon with 2018 Mars mission
SpaceX has entered into an agreement with NASA for a Dragon mission to Mars, set to take place as early as 2018. Known as “Red Dragon”, the variant of the Dragon 2 spacecraft will be launched by the Falcon Heavy rocket, ahead of a soft landing on the surface of Mars. The mission is also part…
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SpaceX plans to debut Red Dragon with 2018 Mars mission
SpaceX has entered into an agreement with NASA for a Dragon mission to Mars, set to take place as early as 2018. Known as “Red Dragon”, the variant of the Dragon 2 spacecraft will be launched by the Falcon Heavy rocket, ahead of a soft landing on the surface of Mars. The mission is also part…
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Falcon 9 rocket wins landmark U.S. Air Force launch contract
File photo of a Falcon 9 launch from Cape Canaveral. Credit: SpaceX SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will launch a third-generation GPS navigation satellite for the U.S. military in 2018, the Air Force said Wednesday, breaking a monopoly held by United Launch Alliance since its formation nearly a decade ago. The second satellite in the Air…
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SpaceX announces plan to send mission to Mars in 2018
Artist’s concept of SpaceX’s Red Dragon spacecraft landing on Mars. Credit: SpaceX Elon Musk’s space transport company — chartered with a long-term goal of colonizing Mars — plans to send the first commercial mission to the red planet as soon as 2018 with assistance from NASA, SpaceX announced Wednesday. Measuring about 20 feet tall and…
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SpaceX Falcon booster comes full circle to Cape Canaveral after landing at sea
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 first-stage booster makes its way back to the company’s processing facility in Florida after its recovery at sea. (Credit: USLaunchReport.com via YouTube) Eleven days after a thrilling landing at sea, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket booster is coming back to the company’s space-age garage in Florida, in preparation for engine tests and potentially the first-ever…
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Falcon 9 booster preparing for reuse testing at KSC
The first stage of the SpaceX Falcon 9, that successfully helped launch the CRS-8 Dragon to the ISS prior to landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic, has completed its Port Canaveral processing. The stage has now been transported to KSC for a series of static fire tests, with the ultimate goal to clear…
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New views of Falcon 9 landing from on-board SpaceX’s drone ship
SpaceX has released new photos of last week’s thrilling rocket landing aboard a floating drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean, showing the 15-story Falcon 9 first stage slowing to a hover just as it touched down on the platform. The first stage booster landed less than nine minutes after launching from Cape Canaveral on Friday…
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Flown Falcon 9 booster hoisted off landing platform
SpaceX rocket technicians offloaded the first stage of a Falcon 9 rocket from its landing platform Tuesday, beginning a pioneering test campaign to verify its readiness for another launch later this year. The 15-story booster arrived at Port Canaveral, a few miles south of the Falcon 9 launch site, around 2 a.m. EDT (0600 GMT)…
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Falcon 9 first stage sails into Port Canaveral atop ASDS – ahead of big plans
The Falcon 9 first stage that successfully landed on the deck of the Autonomous Spaceport Drone Ship (ASDS) barge on Friday sailed into Port Canaveral early on Tuesday. Riding atop “Of Course I Still Love You” the stage is hoping to conduct around ten static test fires ahead of SpaceX’s next reusability milestone of launching the flown…
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SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket returns to port
Photo credit: Stephen Clark/Spaceflight Now Riding into port aboard a floating platform before dawn, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket booster arrived back at Cape Canaveral early Tuesday after sticking a historic landing at sea last week, kicking off a series of inspections and tests before engineers ready it for launch again. A small crowd of…