SpaceX

[weatheriscool]

[Powers]

Imagine Twitter but videocam only

[Time_Traveller]

Private Odysseus lunar lander heads for the moon after SpaceX launch

published about 19 hours ago



A pioneering private moon mission is going well so far.

The robotic Odysseus moon lander, which was built by Houston company Intuitive Machines, launched atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket early this morning (Feb. 15) from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The liftoff went smoothly, and Odysseus got up and running on its own as planned.

The lander has been "successfully commissioned in space by establishing a stable attitude, solar charging and radio communications contact with the company's mission operations center in Houston," Intuitive Machines wrote in a brief update today about eight hours after launch.

Odysseus, which is about the size of an English telephone booth, will reach the moon six days from now, if all goes according to plan.

It will first slip into orbit around Earth's nearest neighbor, then gear up for a Feb. 22 landing attempt on the floor of a small crater about 190 miles (300 kilometers) from the lunar south pole.

https://www.space.com/intuitive-machine ... ay-to-moon

[weatheriscool]

Starship Launch Date and New SpaceX Launch Facilities
February 20, 2024 by Brian Wang

The US Department of the Air Force is preparing an environmental impact statement (EIS) regarding Starship launches from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The review is required by the National Environmental Policy Act for any major action, like construction of a new launch complex.

The study would examine the environmental impacts of converting Space Launch Complex (SLC) 37 at Cape Canaveral into a Starship launch complex.

There are reports of several possible new SpaceX launch facilities. There could be a new SLC-50 or SLC-49 instead of or including the SLC-37 facility.

The new possible launch facilities are all around Cape Canaveral in Florida.

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2024/02/s ... ities.html

[weatheriscool]

SpaceX Talks to FAA About At Least Nine Starship Launches in 2024
February 23, 2024 by Brian Wang
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2024/02/s ... -2024.html

“They’re looking at a pretty aggressive launch schedule this year,” he said. “They’re looking at, I believe, at least nine launches this year. That’s a lot of launches. If you’re doing modifications and doing them one by one, that’s a lot of work. We’ve been talking to SpaceX constantly around the clock, coming together and trying to figure out how do we do this. We’re invested with the company, and so we’ll work with them to get them back going as soon as they can.”

[weatheriscool]

SpaceX Could Launch More in 2024 Than 30 Years of Space Shuttle and Saturn V
February 26, 2024 by Brian Wang

SpaceX plans to launch 144 times in 2024 and has already launched 18 times in less than two months. The space shuttle had 133 successful flights from 1981 to 2011.

SpaceX plans to launch at least 9 Starship flights in 2024. SpaceX Starship could get close to matching the Saturn V launches. SpaceX Falcon Heavy launches combined with Starship launches in 2024 could exceed all Saturn V launches.

During a seven year period a total of 13 Saturn V Space Vehicles were launched, including two unmanned test flights, 10 Apollo flights and one flight which carried the Skylab space station to earth’s orbit.

SpaceX had more launches in less than two months than the Delta IV rocket had for its entire life. There have been 14 successful Delta IV launches.

SpaceX could match the Delta II rockets 155 launches over 29 years in one year.

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2024/02/s ... urn-v.html

[weatheriscool]

[weatheriscool]

[raklian]

[Time_Traveller]

NASA, SpaceX looking to extend lifespan of Crew Dragon spacecraft to 15 flights

published 9 minutes ago



NASA and SpaceX are looking to extend the number of flights that each Crew Dragon capsule can make, from five to 15.

On May 30, 2020, Crew Dragon became the first American spacecraft to carry astronauts to orbit since the space shuttle was retired in 2011, and the first private spacecraft to reach the International Space Station. Since then, Crew Dragon vehicles have flown 49 different astronauts (one of them twice) to space on 13 missions, nine of them for NASA and four of them private.

The Crew Dragon spacecraft known as Endeavour launched to space on March 3 carrying three NASA astronauts and one Russian cosmonaut on SpaceX's Crew-8 mission to the International Space Station. The three other Crew Dragon spacecraft — Resilience, Endurance and Freedom — have all flown to space and back multiple times (three times each for Endurance and Freedom, and two for Resilience), but none has flown as many times as Endeavour.

Crew-8 marks the fifth flight for Endeavour, the maximum number of flights Crew Dragon spacecraft have been qualified for. But this spacecraft, what NASA and SpaceX refer to as the "fleet leader," could potentially prove itself worthy of more flights — possibly many more. According to NASA officials, Crew Dragon might be able to fly up to 15 times, depending on the results of a requalification campaign the agency and SpaceX will undertake this year and next.

During a press briefing on Feb. 28 to discuss the Crew-8 mission, Steve Stich, program manager for NASA's Commercial Crew Program, said SpaceX is currently performing qualification tests of "every single" component on the Dragon spacecraft in order to determine how many flights the spacecraft might be capable of making.

https://www.space.com/spacex-nasa-crew- ... 15-flights