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SpaceX Launches Super-Heavy Satellite Atop Falcon 9 Rocket (usatoday.com)
SpaceX has successfully launched a heavy commercial communications satellite atop one of its Falcon 9 rockets today. "Weighing in at nearly 13,500 pounds atop the rocket, the fourth Inmarsat-5 satellite was the heaviest load lofted by a Falcon 9 yet," reports USA Today. From the report: The 230-foot rocket delivered the spacecraft larger than a double-decker bus to an orbit more than 22,000 miles over the equator. As a result, SpaceX did not attempt to land the rocket's first stage either at Cape Canaveral or at sea, and the Falcon 9 booster was not equipped with landing legs. The Inmarsat-5 Flight 4 satellite, built by Boeing, completes Inmarsat's four-satellite Global Xpress constellation focused on delivering high-speed broadband data to mobile customers, including commercial aircraft and ships and the U.S. military.
Heaviest to GTO, not heaviest overall. They've lofted bigger loads to low earth orbit. Iridium flight was over 9 tons. All Dragon missions to ISS (Dragon + Trunk + all the stuff inside and mounted in the trunk) are also heavier than this sat was.
But different orbits, so this is legit heaviest satellite to this specific orbit.
The limit for recoverability for GTO missions depends on weight and the exact orbit.
A 5300kg (~11600lbs) GTO payload mission has been flown with recovery, wikipedia lists 5500kg as max (perhaps a bit optimistic) for reusable and 8300kg for expendable.
With the same ~33% penalty in payload weight for a recoverable mission, the 5300kg reusable mission could have been a 8000kg expendable mission.
In other words, the 6070kg mission flown yesterday was in just a bit over reusable weight and the in the lower end of expandable mode.
---- Sig. gone.
6100 kilograms for someone actually thinking straight. Don't add precision when you convert.
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