Items tagged with SpaceX
Elon Musk loves a good Twitter tease. The CEO of SpaceX recently posted a few photos of their Starlink satellites that have been loaded into a Falcon fairing. Musk remarked that the first 60 satellites are expected to launch on Wednesday. Starlink is a satellite constellation project that is intended to bring 1 Gbps speeds to users. Musk hopes to launch a total of 12,000 satellites. The satellites will be launched into three different orbital shells. Some of the satellites will form network that will use the V band or a band of frequencies ranging between 40 to 75 GHz. Other satellites will access the Ka band (26.5- 40 GHz) and Ku band (12-18 GHz). Musk noted on Twitter that SpaceX will...
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Stratolaunch is a company founded by the late Paul G. Allen that is trying to make it easier and less costly to put satellites into orbit. Sadly the late Paul Allen didn't live to see his dream take flight, however. Unlike Elon Musk's SpaceX , the way Stratolaunch plans to put satellites into orbit has nothing to do with rockets launched from the ground; rather the company will use what it calls the "world's largest aircraft" to carry satellites as high into the atmosphere as possible, before launching them into orbit. The aircraft that will heft those satellites off the ground is called Roc, and it had its maiden flight recently. The massive aircraft sports a dual fuselage design with a large...
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The scientists and engineers of SpaceX love to smash records. Their list of “firsts” is impressive and includes the first ever propulsive landing for an orbital rocket. Now, not only did SpaceX land three rocket boosters yesterday after their Falcon Heavy launch, but they have also received a NASA contract for an asteroid redirect mission. Footage of the landing the Falcon Heavy side boosters SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket was launched yesterday from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida shortly after 6pm EST. This was the first time SpaceX landed all three of the Falcon Heavy rocket boosters. The two side boosters landed simultaneously and the center core booster...
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SpaceX is currently preparing for the second launch of its Falcon Heavy rocket. After the spectacular success of the first Falcon Heavy launch, there is quite a bit of pressure for SpaceX to perform just as well again. The Falcon Heavy rocket is currently set to launch on April 7th, but some fear that its launch will be delayed. This delay could be terribly inconvenient for both SpaceX and the 100,000 spectators that are expected to flock to Cape Canaveral this weekend. The Falcon Heavy is expected to launch between 6:36 p.m. through 8:35 p.m. EST on April 7th. It will blast off from the historic Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The rocket will...
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SpaceX has performing admirably in its efforts to move the U.S. one step closer to being able to put its own astronauts into orbit again. The company was able to successfully launch its Crew Dragon capsule early this month, and the capsule later splashed down safely on return from the ISS. SpaceX and its CEO, Elon Musk, have a future that sees SpaceX doing more than putting astronauts into low Earth orbit; and that future includes interplanetary missions. Before those missions can be considered, the spacecraft that will be used has to be built and tested; SpaceX is into that testing process with Musk offering up a video of the critical heat shield tiles in testing. Heat shield tiles are the difference...
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At this point, we tend to take it for granted that SpaceX will stick its landings. However, the company's latest landing is one for the books. SpaceX's unmanned Crew Dragon capsule landed off the coast Florida after a trip to the International Space Station. This was the first time in fifty years that an astronaut capsule landed in the Atlantic Ocean and SpaceX’s first orbital test mission. The Crew Dragon capsule successfully detached from the International Space Station (ISS) at 2:30 am EST. It burned its thrusters several times before its final descent. The capsule deployed several parachutes before successfully landing 200 miles off of the coast of Florida at 8:45am EST. SpaceX’s...
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SpaceX has hit a milestone for its Crew Dragon capsule, with an unmanned version of the capsule blasting off to meet up with the International Space Station (ISS). If testing goes well, the goal is to enable the U.S. to send its astronauts into orbit for the first time since the Space Shuttle fleet was retired. SpaceX sent the Crew Dragon capsule into orbit mounted atop one of its own Falcon 9 rockets. No humans were aboard the Crew Dragon capsule for this test launch; the only passenger was a test dummy called Ripley, a reference to the classic sci-fi/horror film Aliens. The launch went off without a hitch and the rocket separated from the capsule about 11 minutes after liftoff. The capsule...
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Elon Musk and the crew over at SpaceX have announced that the company will be shedding about 10% of its workforce, which currently totals over 6,000 employees. SpaceX said that it was going to "part ways" with some workers noting that it had "extraordinarily difficult challenges ahead." The cuts came despite a successful 2018 for the company. A SpaceX spokesman said in an email Reuters obtained, "To continue delivering for our customers and to succeed in developing interplanetary spacecraft and a global space-based Internet, SpaceX must become a leaner company. Either of these developments, even when attempted separately, have bankrupted other organizations." SpaceX was granted FCC approval last...
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Elon Musk and SpaceX have been doing some very cool things over the past decade with rockets. While the rockets SpaceX has been sending into space aren’t the sort capable of flying to the moon or Mars, they are capable of ferrying cargo safely to the ISS in Earth orbit and mostly returning to Earth in one piece. The big news this week was the unveiling of the SpaceX BFR (Big Falcon Rocket) spacecraft that can fly to the moon and beyond. During the unveiling of the rocket, Musk said that the BFR already has its first passenger booked, but during the event, no names were offered. When Musk was asked if he was going to be the first passenger to fly around the moon, he simply tweeted a Japanese...
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One lucky person is about to “boldly go where no [private passenger] has gone before”. SpaceX recently announced that they have booked the world’s first private flight to the moon. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk promised in early 2017 that two tourists would take to the stars by the end of of 2018. Musk hinted that the potential passengers had already paid significant deposits and would begin training for their flights later that year. The passengers were originally supposed to be aboard the Falcon Heavy carrying a Dragon capsule and take off from Kennedy Space Center’s historic Pad 39A near Cape Canaveral. It now appears that the promised passenger will fly in SpaceX’s to-be-revealed...
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Facebook has been embroiled in an almost obscene amount of controversy this past week, as governments begin to ask the social networking giant how a third-party firm managed to acquire comprehensive details on 50 million of its users. A year ago, the idea that Facebook was abused to steer the US election could have been considered a conspiracy, but now, it's widely believed to be likely. Not long after this story originally broke, there was an immediate uptick in the number of people deciding to close or delete their Facebook account. Before long, #DeleteFacebook became a trending hashtag, and it's growing momentum. For a regular user to delete their Facebook account, it may not seem very dramatic....
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Fresh off the historic launch of Falcon Heavy earlier this year, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is once again making big claims about what he wants to do next with his company. While speaking at the SXSW Conference in Austin, Texas over the weekend, Musk claimed that SpaceX will launch a spacecraft towards Mars as soon as next year. “I can tell you what I know currently is the case is that we are building the first ship, the first Mars interplanetary ship right now,” said Musk. “And I think we’ll be able to do short flights, sort of up-and-down flights, probably some time in the first half of next year." Musk is known for his wildly optimistic projections with regards to launches...
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Just a little over a week after making history with the successful launch of Falcon Heavy, SpaceX is once again in the news. This time around, the company has gained FCC approval to lay the groundwork for a satellite-based internet service called Starlink. When we think of satellite internet, problems with latency often crop into our minds. This is because traditional satellites that are capable of delivering internet and TV service operate in a geostationary orbit (GEO) at an altitude of around 36,000 kilometers. However, the satellites that will form the backbone off Starlink will orbit the earth at an altitude of around 1,200 kilometers. This will drastically cut the latency measured from...
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Well, SpaceX has done it! The company's monstrous Falcon Heavy rocket lifted off from the LC-39A launchpad at Cape Canaveral this afternoon, sending CEO Elon Musk's personal Tesla Roadster on an elliptical orbit around the Sun and Mars. There were many unanswered questions before the launch and skepticism, with Murk especially worried about vibrations and the interplay between the three boosters at launch. However, things apparently went off without a hitch. As scheduled, two of the Falcon 9 boosters performed boost back burns once separated from the central booster, and made perfect simultaneous landings back at Cape Canaveral Air Force based on the Landing Zone 1 and Landing Zone 2 pads. The...
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