Tag: Jason 3

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SpaceX rocket lands but tips over after launch

Image: SpaceX Falcon 9 launch
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket rises into the fog from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, sending the Jason 3 sea-watching satellite into space. (Credit: NASA)

Less than a month after SpaceX’s first successful rocket landing, billionaire Elon Musk’s company tried to do it again today – but this time, one of the rocket’s landing legs failed, resulting in a tumble onto its oceangoing landing platform.

Oh, and the Falcon 9 rocket launched a satellite, too.

The primary objective of today’s launch was to put the Jason 3 ocean-mapping satellite into orbit for NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Eumetsat and the French space agency CNES. Jason 3 is designed to monitor changes in sea level from orbit, continuing a decades-long campaign of measurements.

The rocket rose into the fog from its launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, right on time at 10:42 a.m. PT. The launch was judged as a success, but SpaceX had been hoping for a successful landing, too.

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SpaceX rehearses and relives rocket landings

Image: SpaceX Falcon 9 engine test
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket fires its engines during a launch-pad test at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on Monday evening. (Credit: SpaceX)

SpaceX fired the engines of its Falcon 9 rocket on its California launch pad on Monday evening, marking a seemingly successful rehearsal for this weekend’s launch of the Jason 3 ocean-monitoring satellite.

But the rocket’s trickiest maneuver – flying its first-stage booster down to a landing on a platform in the Pacific Ocean – can’t be practiced in advance. For that, SpaceX will have to draw upon past experience, including last month’s rocket touchdown in Florida.

Today SpaceX released slick new footage of that launch and landing.

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SpaceX will try, try again to land a rocket at sea

Image: Falcon 9 first stage landing attempt
A Falcon 9 booster descends toward a ship during SpaceX’s April landing try in the Atlantic. The attempt was unsuccessful, but SpaceX plans to try again in the Pacific on Jan. 17. (Credit: SpaceX)

SpaceX is planning something completely different for its next rocket-landing trick: After launching the U.S.-European Jason 3 satellite on a Falcon 9, it’ll have the first-stage booster fly itself back and try to touch down on a drone ship off California’s coast.

Well, maybe it’s not completely different: The attempt, scheduled for Jan. 17, follows up on last month’s spectacularly successful first-stage landing in Cape Canaveral, Fla. But this could be the first successful at-sea retro rocket landing in history, and the first West Coast rocket recovery.

Landing the booster would be considered a bonus rather than a requirement for mission success. The main objective is to send Jason 3 into orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, adding it to a series of sea-observing satellites.

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