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posted by janrinok on Wednesday March 14 2018, @03:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the busy-little-rockets dept.

SpaceX will attempt to launch five Falcon 9 rockets in April. This includes an International Space Station (ISS) resupply mission and a mission to launch Bangabandhu-1, Bangladesh's first satellite. The Bangabandhu-1 launch is planned to be the first to use SpaceX's Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket, which may be the final major iteration of Falcon 9 before replacement by BFR.

At a South by Southwest (SXSW) panel, Elon Musk said that SpaceX could test the Big Falcon Rocket (BFR) "spaceship" as soon as the first half of 2019. The spaceship is the second stage of the complete BFR rocket, would be capable of reaching orbit without the first stage booster, and alone has over 50% more thrust than an entire Falcon 9.

The initial tests would likely be similar to the Grasshopper vertical takeoff and landing tests.

Also at USA Today, MarketWatch, and SpaceNews.


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  • (Score: 1) by Derf the on Wednesday March 14 2018, @09:08PM

    by Derf the (4919) on Wednesday March 14 2018, @09:08PM (#652593)

    Once they land this first upcoming Falcon 9 Block 5 (on April 5) they still have a center booster et al of the Falcon Heavy Block 5 (in manifest for June 13) to land before I expect the full engineering team can be focused onto the BFG.
    My guess, first BFG flight/hop Oct 2019.