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Take off! SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket lights up the Florida night sky as it launches into orbit carrying an upgraded GPS satellite for the US Space Force
- SpaceX Falcon 9 marked its 20th launch this year with a mission Thursday night
- The rocket took off at 6:24 PM ET, carrying a US Space Force GPS into orbit
- This is SpaceX’s second attempt in the mission – it was canceled on October 2
- GPS joins 31 US Space Force satellites more than 12,000 miles above Earth
The night sky lit up over Cape Canaveral, Florida as SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket took off carrying a US Space Force Global Positioning System (GPS) into orbit.
The rocket launched at 6:24 PM ET, marking the company’s third GPS launch and its 20th mission for this year.
The US Space Force device joins 31 other satellites orbiting Earth more than 12,000 miles above the surface, which circle our planet twice a day.
With seconds left on the clock, mission control said “Falcon 9, ignition” and the rocket activated its Marlin engines which sent out streams of fire and smoke before soaring into space.
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With seconds left on the clock, mission control said “ Falcon 9, ignition ” and the rocket activated its Marlin engines which sent out streams of fire and smoke before soaring into space.
This was SpaceX’s second attempt to send GPS III-SV04 into orbit.
The initial launch was scheduled for October 2, but the Falcon 9’s computers stalled and it took the crew weeks to identify and fix the problem.
SpaceX’s Hans Koenigsmann said: “We looked at the data and saw that two of the engines attempted to start soon.”
Thursday’s launch turned out to be a different story, as the Falcon 9 took off without a problem.
The night sky lit up over Cape Canaveral, Florida as SpaceX launched its Falcon 9 rocket that carried a US Space Force Global Positioning System (GPS) into orbit.
The rocket took off at 6:24 PM ET, marking the company’s third GPS launch
The separation of the race occurred about three minutes after the launch, which sparked applause among the ground crew.
And the GPS separated from the fairing with three minutes and 42 seconds of flight.
Falcon 9 returned to Earth and landed on the drone ship “Of course I still love you”.
The mission markets the 20th launch for SpaceX and the sixth landing of Falcon 9 in 2020.
this was SpaceX’s second attempt to send GPS III-SV04 into orbit. Thursday’s launch turned out to be a different story, as the Falcon 9 took off without a problem
The GPS III-SV04 has now joined the other satellites and, with its updates, brings new features such as the L1C civil signal that will be used with international satellite navigation systems.
The US Space Force took control of US GPS assets in space from the Air Force when it branched out into its own military wing.
GPS satellites are designed to deliver more accurate and powerful signals than previous generations, which increases performance for both civilian and military users.
SpaceX recently dipped its feet into the military market and is working with the US military to develop a rocket capable of delivering weapons across space to any part of the globe within an hour.
The separation of the race occurred about three minutes after the launch, which sparked applause among the ground crew. And the GPS separated from the fairing with three minutes and 42 seconds of flight
The system would allow the transportation of 7,500 odd-mile materials from Cape Canaveral, Florida, to the US-operated Bagram Airport in Afghanistan in less than an hour.
The rocket will be capable of carrying an 80-ton payload, similar to that of a single C-17, and proof of principle tests are expected to begin next year.
The collaboration, which will also include Texas aerospace company xArc, was announced by General Stephen Lyons of the United States Transportation Command.
The first steps of the project will involve an assessment of the potential costs and challenges that must be overcome to deliver the cargo globally in one hour.
“Think of the speed associated with that,” General Lyons said at a conference last month.
I can tell you that SpaceX is moving very, very quickly in this area. I am really excited about the team that is working with SpaceX. ‘
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