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After Months of Delay Following Explosion, SpaceX Finally Launches More Satellites

posted by martyb on Sunday January 15 2017, @03:25AM   Printer-friendly
from the Up-Up-and-Away...-and-back! dept.

takyon writes:

SpaceX is back in business:

SpaceX returned to flight Saturday after a 4½-month hiatus. The private space exploration company headed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk launched a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California at 9:54 a.m. PT, taking 10 satellites into space for voice and data company Iridium. It marked the company's first launch since a Falcon 9 rocket exploded at Cape Canaveral, Florida, in September.

The launch's success Saturday was made even sweeter by a smooth return landing for the Falcon 9 rocket's first stage booster. It safely returned from space and glided to a landing on a seafaring platform, known as a drone ship.

The hosted launch coverage is available on YouTube.

Also at NPR, Reuters, and NYT.

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 15 2017, @05:52AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 15 2017, @05:52AM (#454019)

    Attention wireless listeners. Rich person does thing you will never afford. Worship him because has money.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by bob_super on Monday January 16 2017, @06:41PM

      by bob_super (1357) on Monday January 16 2017, @06:41PM (#454453)

      I was missing the launch because I had read a time in the wrong timezone (someone gave EST for a Vandenberg launch).
      Then I heard it because the way it flew south over the ocean, you could hear it from pretty far inland. The amount of power is just astonishing.
      Then it landed back down right where it was supposed to, while the satellites went to the right orbit. The precision is astonishing.

      You can troll about Musk, but he's hired a pretty impressive engineering team.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by charon on Sunday January 15 2017, @07:07AM

    by charon (5660) on Sunday January 15 2017, @07:07AM (#454033) Journal
    I get excited every time this works, and dejected when it does not. I'm sure in time that reaction will wear off, but in my opinion this is the coolest thing happening on the planet. Reusable spaceships! This is the base of science fiction dreams for a century.

    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 15 2017, @08:48AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 15 2017, @08:48AM (#454042)

      You would suck the decomposing cock of John D Rockefeller if there were anything left of him because he was the richest of the billionaires and you love money.

  • (Score: 2) by ticho on Sunday January 15 2017, @08:56AM

    by ticho (89) on Sunday January 15 2017, @08:56AM (#454043) Homepage Journal

    The signal from the camera was also much more reliable this time, only few very short stutters, instead of entire several seconds of no signal. And this time, the camera was even on the landing stage, not stationary on the barge. Yay progress!