Yahoo – AFP, Kerry Sheridan, December 22, 2015
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| This 9-minute time exposure shows the launch, re-entry, and landing burns of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, which successfully landed in an upright position on December 21, 2015 at Cape Canaveral in Florida (AFP Photo) |
Miami (AFP)
- SpaceX successfully landed its powerful Falcon 9 rocket for the first time, a
major milestone in the drive to cut costs and waste by making rockets as
reusable as airplanes.
Its engines
burning bright orange against the dark night sky, the Falcon 9 made a graceful
arc back to Earth and touched down upright at Cape Canaveral, Florida, minutes
after launching a payload of satellites to orbit, video images showed.
"The
Falcon has landed," a commentator said above the screams and cheers of
people gathered at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California.
SpaceX,
headed by Internet tycoon Elon Musk, is striving to revolutionize the rocket
industry, which currently loses many millions of dollars in jettisoned
machinery and sophisticated rocket components after each launch.
"I
still can't quite believe it," Musk said in a teleconference after the
landing.
"I
think this is a revolutionary moment. No one has ever brought an orbital class
booster back intact."
Previous
attempts to land the Falcon 9's first stage on a floating ocean platform have
failed -- with the rocket either colliding with the autonomous drone ship or
tipping over.
But this
time, video images on SpaceX's live webcast showed the tall, white portion of
the rocket -- known as the first stage -- appearing to settle down firmly and
stick the landing.
The rocket
reached a height of 125 miles (200 kilometers) before heading back to Earth and
touching down at a former US Air Force rocket and missile testing range that
was last used in 1978.
Video
images were cut off within seconds of the landing, and the SpaceX live webcast
returned to its commentators, who described the successful deployment of the
rocket's payload of 11 satellites for ORBCOMM, a global communications company.
The US
space agency NASA applauded the feat.
"Congratulations
@SpaceX on your successful vertical landing of the first stage back on
Earth!" NASA said in a tweet.
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SpaceX's
Falcon 9 rocket pictured on December 16, 2015 (AFP Photo)
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High
stakes
The stakes
were high for SpaceX, which has a $1.6 billion contract with NASA to supply the
astronauts living at the International Space Station over numerous
back-and-forth trips with its Dragon cargo ship.
Just six
months ago, a devastating explosion -- caused by a faulty strut -- destroyed
the Falcon 9 about two minutes after launch, along with hundreds of millions of
dollars in cargo and equipment bound for the ISS.
The company
fixed that problem and also made the newest version of the Falcon 9 about 30
percent more powerful than previous iterations, Musk said.
Adding to
the competitive nature of the commercial space industry, Amazon founder Jeff
Bezos's rocket company Blue Origin announced last month it had successfully
landed its New Shepard rocket after a suborbital flight.
"Congrats
@SpaceX on landing Falcon's suborbital booster stage. Welcome to the
club," Bezos said on Twitter Monday night.
Analysts
have pointed out that although New Shepard was first, that SpaceX's feat would
be harder to accomplish because the Falcon 9 flies higher in altitude.
"Because
SpaceX's vehicle was designed to place a constellation of satellites in orbit,
the Falcon 9's first stage flew at significantly greater speeds and more than
double the altitude of what New Shepherd reached last month," the
Commercial Spaceflight Federation said in a statement.
It called
the landing an "incredible achievement" in an industry that is
seeking to drive down costs and make spaceflight cheaper and more accessible to
tourists and adventurers.
Canadian
astronaut Chris Hadfield added his congratulations.
"That
was a hard landing to stick. Opens a brand new door to space travel. I look
forward to the details," he wrote on Twitter.
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