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On Fourth Launch Attempt, SpaceX Falcon 1 Reaches Orbit

Posted by timothy on from the pure-congratulations dept.

xp65 writes with the just-announced success of Elon Musk's SpaceX's long efforts to reach orbit with a privately-developed launching craft: "T+0:08:21 Falcon 1 reached orbital velocity, 5200 m/s Nominal Second stage cut off (SECO) — Falcon 1 has made history as the first privately developed liquid fueled launch vehicle to achieve earth orbit!" dbullard adds "This was a completely new vehicle — it's not using any previously developed hardware. All developed from scratch. No government supplied hardware, Russian engines, or old ICBM motors. My hat's off to the employees of Space X — all 550 of them. (Note — no 'cast of thousands,' just 550). They've got video of the entire launch."

2 of 518 comments (clear)

  1. YES!!! by FleaPlus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've been waiting for their success for the past 5 years or so, and I'm absolutely ecstatic.

    They have a couple more Falcon 1 flights scheduled for this year, with their first Falcon 9 flight next year. The Falcon 9 is considerably larger, and is the vehicle SpaceX plans to use for delivering cargo and crew to the International Space Station.

    I imagine that there's been a number of announcements waiting in the wings for SpaceX's first successful flight. Perhaps we'll be hearing soon about a more formal arrangement between SpaceX and Bigelow Aerospace with their private space station plans?

  2. Re:Week of newsworth orbits by barzok · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's relatively trivial for a nation of over a billion people and a strong centralized government to develop a space program

    Especially when they've purchased a large quantity of the required technology from Russia.