Category: Rockets

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SpaceX just launched the Falcon Heavy, its most powerful rocket, and landed 2 boosters

sudshr47 February 6, 2018

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After years of delays and technical difficulties, it finally happened. 

SpaceX just launched its most powerful rocket ever. 

The Falcon Heavy took flight into a clear sky in Cape Canaveral, Florida with hundreds of thousands of people watching online and in person. 

The roar of the rocket – which is effectively three of the company’s Falcon 9 boosters strapped together – was deafening, even from miles away. The ground shook. 

SpaceX then brought home two of the Falcon Heavy’s three nine engine rocket boosters, landing two by land next to each other. As of publish, we’re still waiting for news about the third booster, which was attempting to land on a drone ship in the ocean. Read more…

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SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy launch will make you excited about spaceflight again

sudshr47 February 5, 2018

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Watching a rocket launch into space is like nothing else. 

Your heart races. Your palms sweat, and when you hear that terminal count kick in – 10, 9, 8, 7… – it really hits home that this is a wondrous feat of engineering that you’re fervently hoping will go right, but could also be moments away from turning into a ball of flame. 

It feels like seconds stretch into hours as you’re waiting for the rocket to lift off, and then suddenly, in the blink of an eye, the rocket is in the air, moving swiftly up into the clouds. 

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SpaceX is about to launch its most powerful rocket yet

sudshr47 February 5, 2018

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SpaceX is about to light its biggest candle ever

The Elon Musk-founded company is planning to launch the maiden flight of its Falcon Heavy rocket on Feb. 6, propelling the launcher into the history books as one of the most powerful rockets in history

Assuming it doesn’t blow up. 

Which is a big assumption: Musk himself has tempered expectations for this launch, saying that there’s a good shot that the test launch may go awry

“There’s a lot of risk associated with the Falcon Heavy; real good chance that vehicle doesn’t make it to orbit,” Musk said during a talk in July 2017.

“I hope it makes it far enough away from the pad that it does not cause pad damage. I would consider even that a win to be honest. And yeah. Major pucker factor, really. There’s, like, no other way to describe it.” Read more…

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SpaceX rocket meant to be destroyed somehow survives

sudshr47 February 1, 2018

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SpaceX had a delightful surprise on Wednesday.

The private spaceflight company launched its Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral with Luxembourg’s first military satellite, GovSat-1, in tow.

The satellite, to be used for secure communications over sea and humanitarian operations, was successfully deployed 32 minutes into its flight. 

But in that time, something rather remarkable happened: A Falcon 9 first stage booster survived its water landing in the Atlantic Ocean. That wasn’t supposed to happen. 

In fact, the booster appears to be relatively intact, and now SpaceX will try to bring the rocket back to shore. Read more…

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Booster from Chinese rocket crashes to Earth near a small town

sudshr47 January 12, 2018

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A booster from a Chinese rocket appears to have crash-landed and exploded after a satellite launch on Friday.

According to a report from GB Times, one of four rocket boosters from a Long March 3B rocket crashed near the town of Xiangdu, reportedly about 435 miles (or around 700 kilometers) from the launch site. 

As The Verge‘s Loren Grush notes, China seems perfectly fine launching their rockets from inland launchpads, unlike the U.S., meaning the rockets fly over and shed parts over land, leading to incidents like that on Friday.

Video of the incident was caught and shared to social media.  Read more…

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Secret government satellite’s fate remains a secret

sudshr47 January 9, 2018

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Just call it Schrödinger’s rocket launch.

A classified government mission launched to space atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket may or may not be functioning in orbit after its Sunday night launch from Florida; but aside from some rumors and anonymous quotes, we really don’t know what’s going on with the U.S.’s secret satellite.

According to anonymous sources quoted in stories published in the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg, the mission — codenamed Zuma — appears to have failed to separate from the rocket as expected after launch.  Read more…

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SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket looks just like the beast it is

sudshr47 December 20, 2017

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Elon Musk’s SpaceX is closer than ever to launching a brand new rocket. 

The private spaceflight company is finally just about ready to launch its Falcon Heavy rocket on its first test flight in January. And now Musk is finally giving the waiting public a glimpse of what that rocket looks like in all its glory. 

Musk shared the new photos showing off the heavy-lift rocket on Twitter Wednesday.

Falcon Heavy at the Cape pic.twitter.com/hizfDVsU7X

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 20, 2017

The Falcon Heavy is SpaceX’s next big rocket, capable of bringing payloads and even people deep into the solar system. Read more…

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It looks like a Russian space mission failed on Tuesday, jeopardizing multiple satellites

sudshr47 November 28, 2017

It’s not looking good for Russia’s newest weather satellite, which was launched on Tuesday morning. 
Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency, released a statement after the launch of the Meteor-M polar-orbiting weather satellite along with 18 small pay…

View More It looks like a Russian space mission failed on Tuesday, jeopardizing multiple satellites