A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off from Florida on Friday with a cargo ship bound for the International Space Station and the launch vehicle’s reusable main-stage booster set to attempt a quick return landing on an ocean platform, NASA said.
Advertisement
Elon Musk, head of the private space exploration company, held a press conference with NASA after liftoff to speak about the launch and the landing of the rocket at sea – a feat that was attempted numerous times by SpaceX in the past. President Barack Obama shared a tweet congratulating Musk and NASA for their hard work and innovation. This includes samples collected during NASA’s one-year mission, where now-retired American astronaut Scott Kelly spent 340 days in space.
The B330 could also be used as a lunar base on day, he said. “World-leading ability, proven. Opens the imagination to what is possible”.
This is SpaceX’s first shipment for the International Space Station in a year.
There’s a lonely Falcon 9 rocket standing proudly by itself atop an autonomous landing pad barge in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean right now. The spacecraft is filled with about 7,000 pounds of supplies and science experiments, including an expandable habitat. As reported by the Houston Chronicle, the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, or BEAM – made from kevlar-like material that is inflatable – could “change the entire dynamic for human habitation” in space, Bigelow noted. NASA plans to keep the airlock between BEAM and the space station closed. That moment will mark another first, this time for NASA – the first time that each of the agency’s commercial cargo suppliers will have a craft docked at the space station simultaneously.
Next, the booster will undergo a series of tests, including 10 static fires on the launchpad, before engineers decide if it is in good enough shape to fly again. In the future, the billionaire businessman hopes that launches will be as frequent as every few weeks.
In the meantime, SpaceX will keep working on perfecting its landing techniques, whether on ocean or solid ground, since both options need to be available to suit different types of missions. The drone ship landings are especially needed for “high velocity missions”, which would allow payloads such as satellites to reach a higher orbit, he said.
Advertisement
But if the commercial sector can build innovative rockets that can be reused, many think that would dramatically reduce the costs, a key step toward making space travel more routine.
