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Falcon Heavy Maiden Launch Successful (Mostly)

posted by martyb on Tuesday February 06 2018, @09:10PM   Printer-friendly
from the it-IS-rocket-science dept.

takyon writes:

Update: Launch seems to have been successful. The two side boosters landed nearly simultaneously. Footage from the drone ship was cut off. The car made it into space; but the third stage will need to coast through the Van Allen radiation belts for around six hours before it makes the final burn for trans-Mars injection.

Update 2: The middle booster of SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket failed to land on its drone ship
Falcon Heavy Post-Launch Media Briefing - Megathread

SpaceX's newest rocket, the Falcon Heavy, is set to be launched at around 1:30 PM EST (6:30 PM UTC) today. The launch window extends to 4:00 PM EST (9:00 PM UTC).

SpaceX will attempt to recover all three boosters during the launch. The two previously-flown side boosters will attempt to land nearly simultaneously at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Landing Zones 1 and 2. The center core will attempt to land on a drone barge hundreds of miles off the coast of Florida.

The dummy payload for the Falcon Heavy is Elon Musk's personal 2008 Tesla Roadster. It is carrying a mannequin wearing SpaceX's space suit flight suit that will be used when the company begins to send astronauts to the International Space Station. The car will be launched into a heliocentric orbit that will bring it close to Mars (and back near Earth) periodically, and is equipped with three cameras. Its stereo system will be playing David Bowie's Space Oddity.

If the launch is successful, the Falcon Heavy could be flown within the next 3 to 6 months for a customer such as the U.S. Air Force, Arabsat, Inmarsat, or ViaSat.

Falcon Heavy will be capable of launching 63,800 kg to low-Earth orbit (LEO), 26,700 kg to geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO), 16,800 kg to Mars, or 3,500 kg to Pluto (New Horizons was 478 kg). It will supplant the Delta IV Heavy, which is capable of launching 28,790 kg to LEO or 14,220 kg to GTO. Space Launch System Block 1 will be capable of launching 70,000 kg to LEO (Block 1B: 105,000 kg to LEO, Block 2: 130,000 kg to LEO).

Musk has suggested that an additional two side boosters could be added to Falcon Heavy (perpendicularly?) to make a "Falcon Super Heavy" with even more thrust. This may not happen if SpaceX decides to focus on the BFR instead, which as planned would be able to launch 150,000 kg to LEO while being fully reusable and potentially cheaper than the Falcon 9 (or capable of launching 250,000 kg to LEO in expendable mode).

The webcast can be seen here or directly on YouTube.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday February 06 2018, @09:30PM (9 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 06 2018, @09:30PM (#634105) Journal
    Not only did the launch go without a hitch, but they have a beautiful, choreographed landing of the two side cores at Cape Canaveral. SpaceX did a remarkable job today.
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  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday February 06 2018, @09:57PM (3 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Tuesday February 06 2018, @09:57PM (#634118)

    Congrats to SpaceX on a great launch... how long before we get solid news about the central booster's fate on the Drone ship?

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]

  • (Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Tuesday February 06 2018, @10:30PM

    by wonkey_monkey (279) on Tuesday February 06 2018, @10:30PM (#634141) Homepage

    That was the best part. I forgot what I exclaimed, but I exclaimed it out loud.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk

  • (Score: 2) by EvilSS on Tuesday February 06 2018, @11:14PM

    by EvilSS (1456) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 06 2018, @11:14PM (#634168)
    That's definitely going into my top 10 coolest things I've ever seen list, right after watching a freaking car spin slowly in orbit above the earth. I had to keep reminding myself this wasn't CGI but real life.

  • (Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday February 06 2018, @11:41PM

    by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 06 2018, @11:41PM (#634184)

    Agreed. If i had known what watching the stream was going to be like then i would have gathered my friends together in front of a big TV and drank during the launch. Amazing.

    --
    SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.

  • (Score: 2) by theluggage on Wednesday February 07 2018, @12:28AM (1 child)

    by theluggage (1797) on Wednesday February 07 2018, @12:28AM (#634223)

    That shot of the two boosters landing looked like a 1970s artists impression of what 1980 was going to look like - finally come alive.

    Seriously: Bono, P., Gatland, K. (1969) Frontiers of Space (p63 - S-IVB Recovery Sequence). Blandford Press, London. ISBN 0 7137 3504 X.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday February 08 2018, @06:09AM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 08 2018, @06:09AM (#634714) Journal
      My friend remarked while we were seeing that landing live: "Like God and Heinlein intended." Which is interesting given that the saying was first used [wordpress.com] for the DC-X by Arlan Andrews while describing the vertical landing capabilities of that vehicle (and subsequently used in reference [wordpress.com] to other vehicles with vertical landing capabilities). It certainly was like looking at some science fiction artwork from long ago.