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SpaceX Successfully Launches Falcon 9 Rocket
leetrout writes "SpaceX has successfully launched a two-stage rocket, the Falcon 9, into Earth orbit from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. 'Liftoff came after hours of delay, sparked initially by launchpad telemetry problems, then by a sailboat that strayed into a restricted area of the launch range. The day's first countdown was aborted at virtually the last second, due to a problem with the engine parameters, but the launch software was adjusted and a second countdown went all the way to the end.'"
Update: 06/04 20:16 GMT by S : Reader mrcaseyj points out Spaceflight Now's coverage, which includes a number of pictures from the launch.
Huge benefits to humanity? Really? I don't think so.
The hugest benefit to mankind is OIL, making EVERYTHING possible.
Rockets? Since 1957, you Space Nutters have had FIVE decades to show us these "benefits". Besides stoking the imagination of dreamers and deluded petulant children like GameboyRMH, there's precious little it has accomplished. Does it make clothes? Food? Materials?
Nope. Not denying the uses of communication satellites and weather satellites and a few fun probes, but let's face it, very little would be different today without access to space.
Now, watching people get old, weak, infirm, dumb, slow and weak from aging is a daily horror for everyone on this planet.
Wake me up when these rich dreamers remove advanced glycation endproducts from adult humans safely, cheaply and repeatably.
Where was the fanfare when the molecule LJ001 was shown to destroy all viruses? You want "huge benefits" to mankind? There's one right there! Suddenly a white metal tube filled with kerosene just seems like the silly toy it is.
You want to explore? Explore the workings of a cell. I think you'll find it immensely more challenging than Space Nuttery, and much more rewarding.
_We don't understand how matter arranges itself into US._
And you want pictures of rocks floating in a vacuum?
We live short lives, we get sick easily, we are fragile. This is what you want to colonize space with? Guess what, *we* won't. Maybe our modified descendents will, *if* there's enough energy !!!
Ah! You mean the racist and Hitler admirer Obama who sent his troops to Afghanistan to prepare for an invasion of Russia. JA, WIR KONNEN!