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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.
Good news for Obama and his vision for private industry servicing the ISS. Hopefully they won't delay their first ISS mission until 2011.
What makes this one of the most important rocket launches in history is that, unlike at other rocket companies, the founder, Elon Musk, is determined to make a reusable rocket. The first stage of this rocket has been fitted with parachutes and covered with cork to protect it from the heat of reentry so that it can be recovered and studied in hopes of making them reusable in the future. The success of this launch solidifies the success of Spacex, and thereby dramaitcally increases the chances of huge benefits to humanity from much more affordable space launch. Also, the other rocket companies are probably very worried about losing all their business to Spacex now.
I'm making a note here -- huge success!
Hopefully this will reinvigorate the US market for launch vehicles. The satellite-manufacturing spin-off company of the research centre where I work currently launches most if not all of its payloads on decommissioned Russian ICBMs. I hope that in a couple of years, SpaceX's stable of launchers will be a practical and economical alternative!
Pirate Party UK
I figure we slashdotters would climb on just about anything too...
I tried to watch it from here in Orlando, but too many clouds were in the way. Went back inside and watched the feed - very impressive.
As a kid I dreamed that I might one day visit the moon, or maybe even mars. That's not going to happen, but hopefully somebody will get it all worked out in time for my grand-kids maybe.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Does anyone have a link to launch video? Thanks.
-molo
Using your sig line to advertise for friends is lame.
I laughed at the feeble attempts of the giant alien wasp to stop the launch at T -5 or so. Was that you, K'breel, or one of your minions?
Earlier today they had a launch abort at T -0:00:00. I happened to watch the webcast on the SpaceX site; the countdown got to zero and my impression was that ignition was underway when the launch was aborted.
Had they used solid rockets, they'd have been SOL at this late stage.
Also, finding the cause and then being able to launch inside 1.5 hours is rather quick. ISTR early Shuttle launches where the slightest setback resulted in putting the clock back to T -12h.
And was the countdown off, or was the webcast not properly synchronized? I saw liftoff taking place at T -0:00:02.
Well, they had explicitly demonstrated that ability earlier when they did the launch pad test-firing. Being able to do that in the first place is a big advantage of liquid fueled rockets over solid fuel. But yeah, it's definitely cool being able to see that a real last-second abort works just like it did in the tests. Major kudos to the operations team (who I believe, like the previous test, are SpaceX employees which marks a break from traditional launches), and of course to the engineers and machinists and everyone else.
The enemies of Democracy are
It's not the elimination of the NASA manned rocket program. It's about the descoping of the poorly conceived and poorly executed NASA manned rocket design and manufacturing program; whose significant purpose was employment in Alabama congressional districts. A private contractor will not decide on the mission goals or the payload. One can have robust manned space program without designing the rockets.
In 1965 NASA had to design and build its own microcomputers. NASA does not do so any more; astronauts use standard laptop computers on the ISS.
CNN has a nice video of the launch which shows everything up to the 2nd stage ignition. Apparently the Dragon capsule was put into orbit, which was the ultimate milestone of the launch. Congratz, SpaceX!
WHOOHOO YEAH!!!!
(maybe the NASA cuts won't eviscerate spaceflight after all)
I do not have a sig. You are hallucinating.
Necessity and Incentives Opening the Space Frontier
Testimony before the House Subcommittee on Space
by James Bowery, Chairman
Coalition for Science and Commerce
July 31, 1991
Mr. Chairman and Distinguished Members of the Subcommittee:
I am James Bowery, Chairman of the Coalition for Science and Commerce. We greatly appreciate the opportunity to address the subcommittee on the critical and historic topic of commercial incentives to open the space frontier.
The Coalition for Science and Commerce is a grassroots network of citizen activists supporting greater public funding for diversified scientific research and greater private funding for proprietary technology and services. We believe these are mutually reinforcing policies which have been violated to the detriment of civilization. We believe in the constitutional provision of patents of invention and that the principles of free enterprise pertain to intellectual property. We therefore see technology development as a private sector responsibility. We also recognize that scientific knowledge is our common heritage and is therefore a proper function of government. We oppose government programs that remove procurement authority from scientists, supposedly in service of them. Rather we support the inclusion, on a per-grant basis, of all funding needed to purchase the use of needed goods and services, thereby creating a scientist-driven market for commercial high technology and services. We also oppose government subsidy of technology development. Rather we support legislation and policies that motivate the intelligent investment of private risk capital in the creation of commercially viable intellectual property.
In 1990, after a 3 year effort with Congressman Ron Packard (CA) and a bipartisan team of Congressional leaders, we succeeded in passing the Launch Services Purchase Act of 1990, a law which requires NASA to procure launch services in a commercially reasonable manner from the private sector. The lobbying effort for this legislation came totally from taxpaying citizens acting in their home districts without a direct financial stake -- the kind of political intended by our country's founders, but now rarely seen in America.
We ask citizens who work with us for the most valuable thing they can contribute: The voluntary and targeted investment of time, energy and resources in specific issues and positions which they support as taxpaying citizens of the United States. There is no collective action, no slush-fund and no bureaucracy within the Coalition: Only citizens encouraging each other to make the necessary sacrifices to participate in the political process, which is their birthright and duty as Americans. We are working to give interested taxpayers a voice that can be heard above the din of lobbyists who seek ever increasing government funding for their clients.
Introduction
Americans need a frontier, not a program.
Incentives open frontiers, not plans.
If this Subcommittee hears no other message through the barrage of studies, projections and policy recommendations, it must hear this message. A reformed space policy focused on opening the space frontier through commercial incentives will make all the difference to our future as a world, a nation and as individuals.
Americans Need a Frontier
When Neil Armstrong stepped foot on the moon, we won the "space race" against the Soviets and entered two decades of diminished expectations.
The Apollo program elicited something deep within Americans. Something almost primal. Apollo was President Kennedy's "New Frontier." But when Americans found it was terminated as nothing more than a Cold War contest, we felt betrayed in ways we are still unable to articulate -- betrayed right down to our pioneering souls. The result is that Americans will never again truly believe i
Seastead this.
Well done Elon, Here's hoping you can stay afloat a little longer to get us back into space!
So does it just orbit for a while and coming crashing back down to earth in a few months / years?
Sig: I stole this sig.
Well, that is pretty cool, that universal virus destroyer. I mean really, it is. But you could have put all that up as an article instead of dumping on a space thread. Both have their place.
If you did and it was rejected, no probs. Wait a week, re-write it, try it again.
Huh?
No one wants to killed manned NASA flights, just the boondoggle that is their latest vehicle project. It only serves to keep shuttle makers in business.
During the second stage burn, the vehicle appeared to start to rotate, gradually accelerating as the burn continued. Does anyone know if this was part of the planned ascent profile, or something gone wrong?
It's hard to tell due to the angle of the rocketcam camera, but it didn't appear to be rolling around the vehicle's axis --- which makes it more of a tumble. OTOH, that might have been an optical illusion. I gather that the Dragon demonstrator that was being launched didn't have any propulsion, so this could have been planned to spin-stabilise it, but... it did look odd.
I don't want to put any dampeners on the launch, though. For a first launch of a prototype rocket, it's still a fantastic achievement to get to orbit first time.
Actually, the crazy ones are the ones who hold on to their wealth. Money is for spending, it has no other worthwhile purpose.
Amusingly enough, the pictures at supersonic speed look like a condom around the Rocket, looks like its preparing to rape NASA the safe way.
The article says SpaceX got $278 million from NASA to develop the rocket. Apparently we spent $1.500 billion on Ares in FY10 alone, and spent $445 million on a single sub-orbital test flight for Ares in '09.
This just proves how far CGI has gotten. They've been able to shut down the California sound stage.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
I believe it's also the Senator from Alabama that hold's NASA's purse strings, so no money for space flight unless Alabama gets a big chunk.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
I work on the Cape. Here are some pics my friend took. Here. Here is my crappy iPhone video: here (launch starts around 2:40).
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Could someone tell me if there is anything wrong with using a light gas cannon as the first two stages of a rocket as John Hunter proposes? Is the amount of propellant needed to fire the gun more than would be required by a traditional kerosene/LOX motor? It sounds to me like a space cannon would be an inexpensive way to launch non-living cargo mass. Has nobody invested in this sort of project because the space gun people all went to work for Saddam Hussein?
It seems to me that Obama and the OMB want to kill manned exploratory spaceflight. And even more than that. Consider that everyone but USA is going to the moon and soon. But so far not manned. Of course, last I looked Bolton had to check with OMB to go to the john. I am sure OMB just cannot justify it from a bean counter perspective, but they really really want a mars colony. On the other hand, there is widespread suspicion that Obama and OMB are breaking the law with their cutbacks. All this is really consistent with your perspective.
A bit like this
http://michaelsmith.id.au
For such an expensive rocket launch, you'd think they'd at least have a professional photographer with professional lenses. Those pictures are terrible. Look at the flames; there's no detail. They obviously used cheap lenses. I'm an amateur photographer, but I have professional equipment because I'm too picky to have my pictures look as bad as their launch pictures do. I'm glad the launch succeeded, but you'd think they'd want better pictures for examining the launch and for PR.
What is the difference in payload size and weight of the soyuz versus the dragon? Do you know? Given the size of the rockets I get the impression the soyuz will be needed for really big payloads for a while. Or is it because the soyuz capsule is just really heavy itself. Not sure if you know, but...
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
Ive never seen NASA recover from a near launch abort as quickly as spacex with a recovery time of less than an hour, :)
and yes it did enhance the drama
The ISS is in LEO. Plus this launcher was originally designed to be GEO capable as well. Try reading the spec sheets at spacex.com.
It should also be noted that the entire amount of money spent on SpaceX so far, from the company's inception until today (counting private investment as well as the money from NASA), comes to about half the cost of a single shuttle launch.
We are not against spending money on NASA or on manned space flight. We're against spending money wastefully. Don't throw money at a program just for the sake of throwing money at a program. Ares was a bad idea and needed to be axed. Being truly committed to the future of manned spaceflight pretty much entails being for the axing of stupid programs and spending wisely on stuff that actual works without bankrupting the program.
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
would disagree, it also makes for a lovely swimming pool.
This is many $/kg cheaper than either the Atlas or the Delta series, with the goal of becoming cheaper still. Atlas and delta, developed on a cost plus basis, don't even have that as a goal.
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1