Falcon Heavy Ready To Launch For The Second Time

https://techcrunch.com/2019/04/05/falcon-heavys-first-real-launch-on-sunday-is-the-dawn-of-a-new-heavy-lift-era-in-space/

The Falcon Heavy has flown before, but now it’s got a payload that matters and competitors nipping at its heels. It’s the first of a new generation of launch vehicles that can take huge payloads to space cheaply and frequently, opening up a new frontier in the space race. Watch it lift off Sunday afternoon (we’ll post a reminder).

On the 7th, Falcon Heavy will fly for the first time since its inaugural test last February, delivering the now-infamous Tesla Roadster and “Starman” into a trajectory that has taken them past Mars. That successful launch garnered SpaceX its first customer for the system, and Sunday’s launch will take Arabsat-6A, a Lockheed-built communications satellite, into geosynchronous orbit.

From:Tech Crunch .com

Falcon Heavy Ground Test is a Success

This is a test fire in advance of SpaceX's upcoming Falcon 9 Heavy test launch. The test occurred on 1/24/2018 at Kennedy Space Center's LC-39 Pad A which is the same pad that many Apollo and Space Shuttle launches took place from. SpaceX is currently leasing the pad from NASA. Birds can been seen scattering near the area and the delayed rumble of the 12 second test can also be heard. No date has yet been announced for the test launch. This launch will be the first time SpaceX has launched a vehicle of this configuration and at 140,700 lb to low Earth orbit, it will represent the largest lift capacity of any currently available rocket. Although still short of the 150,000 to 290,000 lb capacity of NASA's upcoming SLS rocket (and well shy of Saturn V's 310,000 lb capacity), this rocket will more than double what is currently available from the Delta IV Heavy.



Video and article by: Dennis Kapatos

Eight Days in a Garbage Can

Eight Days in a Garbage Can As NASA’s efforts to land humans on the Moon picked up speed in the mid-1960s, several skills had to be mastered: spacewalking, rendezvous, docking, and long-duration spaceflight. On Gemini IV, Ed White demonstrated NASA astronauts had the know-how to function outside the spacecraft. Gemini V, NASA’s second two-astronaut flight, which launched fifty years ago this week, kept the crew in orbit for eight days, the projected length of an Apollo lunar landing mission, and set a new space endurance record. Astronauts Gordon Cooper and Pete Conrad are seen here just prior to being sealed in their Gemini capsule, which Conrad likened to a “flying garbage can” because of its cramped quarters, which were not much larger than the front seat of a Volkswagen Beetle.

Image credit: NASA