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SpaceX's Latest Launch Successful, But Ends With a "Hard Landing" (theverge.com)

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the that's-some-soft-pedalling dept.

Eloking writes with this news from The Verge: SpaceX successfully launched its Falcon 9 rocket into space this afternoon, but — as expected — failed to land the vehicle on a drone ship at sea afterward. CEO Elon Musk said the rocket 'landed hard' on the drone ship. The mission requirements made a successful landing unlikely. This was SpaceX's fourth attempt to land the Falcon 9 post-launch on an autonomous drone ship floating in the ocean. All of the previous sea landings failed too, though the third attempt came very close. The company had low hopes of a successful landing from the start of this mission, since the rocket had to send a heavy satellite into a high orbit. That requires a lot of fuel for the launch itself, so there wasn't much fuel left for the rocket's return to Earth and powered landing.

2 of 129 comments (clear)

  1. Successful, but... by PopeRatzo · · Score: -1, Troll

    My effort to run a marathon was also successful, but I didn't finish.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
    1. Re:Successful, but... by PopeRatzo · · Score: -1, Troll

      The finished the marathon (launch very heavy satellite), they just failed their secondary goal of leading at least one mile of the race (landing on barge).

      "His jump off the Empire State Building was successful, but his secondary goal of landing safely was a disaster."

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.