The aerospace company SpaceX first reached out to retrieve the first floor of a rocket. Early on Tuesday, the Falcon 9 lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida (USA), to set 11 communication satellites in orbit. Then the first floor of the rocket came down and landed safely a few kilometers from the launch site.
The success of the mission, which took just over 30 minutes made a crucial time for the California company founded by Elon Musk. This was the first flight since the accident with a rocket that exploded in June 2015, destroying a cargo ship that would supply the International Space Station (ISS, its acronym in English).
However, the Falcon 9 was improved. The rocket, with an equivalent of 23 stories high (about 68 meters), lifted off at 20h29 on Monday in the United States (1:29 a.m. Lisbon). After dropping the second floor of the rocket, the first floor – with about 41 meters and nine engines – came down to the ground ten minutes after take-off, landing 9.6 kilometers south of the launch site
The entrepreneur Elon Musk said that the ability to recover the first stage of the rocket, so they can be refurbished and fly again, would cut the operating costs of the company. Only the first floor of the rocket without fuel, weighs between 23 and 26 tons.
When you observe the return and landing of the rocket, controlled by thrusters and with the help of four arms that supported the landing of the Falcon 9, SpaceX workers rejoiced. “Welcome, dear!” Wrote Elon Musk, in a message on Twitter. Jeff Bezos, chief executive of rival company Blue Origin, founded by Amazon.com, which a month ago had achieved a similar feat, receiving at the time a compliment Musk, SpaceX greeted back: “Welcome to the club!”
But the success of SpaceX was obtained during a trade mission, was not only a test like the Blue Origin. The second floor of the Falcon 9, after separating the first floor continued to rise up to 800 kilometers altitude with the help of engines, delivering 11 satellites in ORBCOMM company. The company now has a network of 17 satellites that cost $ 200 million (€ 182 million).
The SpaceX, he faces more than 60 missions in the amount of 8000 million (7300 million euros), had already failed two attempts to land rockets on a platform in the ocean. And since June 28 that he had not done any launching rockets. On that date a Falcon 9 exploded shortly after takeoff on a mission to supply the ISS
But the problem that caused the explosion was identified:. Had a beam that was faulty and supported a helium bottle that was inside the upper floor of the rocket, which contained fuel. When the structure broke, helium filled the tank, increasing the pressurization and causing the tank to explode. So SpaceX changed the supplier of metal beams, said Elon Musk told reporters.
News updated at 13.50
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