SpaceX has a very busy launch schedule - 8 possible launches before year end

SpaceX appears fully recovered from it's single mission failure last year. They have managed several landings - first at it's new landing site at Cape Canaveral and then at sea - a much more difficult task, but an important one as not all missions are able to send the rocket all the way back to the cape. Landing the Falcon 9 rocket has always been a secondary mission objective - but a very important one in support of SpaceX's reusable rocket goal.

Rocket reusability is not only important for its cost savings, but also for the ability to shorting the time between launches. Even now the company is turning out missions faster than has ever been done before. And with the current schedule it will be launching multiple rockets in a single month. Here is the current launch schedule (with a lot of the exact launch dates still TBD):

Sept. 3	Amos 6
Sept. 19	Iridium Next 1-10
October	SES 10
October	EchoStar 23
October	Fermosat 5 and Sherpa
November	SES 11 (EchoStar 105)
November	Falcon Heavy Demo Flight
Nov. 11	CRS 10 (SPX 10)

Even with the their track record of quick turn arounds, this schedule would not be possible if all of the launches were from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral. But with some flights out of Vandenberg AFB, and Falcon Heavy launching from the reconfigured SLC-39A at Kennedy Space Center, it could just happen.

Speaking of Falcon Heavy, with several rockets having been successfully landed now, it is what I'm looking forward to next (and I'm sure I'm not alone). Falcon Heavy has been anticipated for some time now. And had the big rocket just made a successful flight and ended up as the foundation of a new reef in the Atlantic, I would have been thrilled. But with the current landing success rate - and the presence of the landing complex - the possibility of the three Falcon 9 rockets separating and each landing itself autonomously is a real possibility. Would that be a sight to see!

Then what? We still have the manned Dragon 2 as well as the new Raptor engine (with greater power and re-useablity) to look forward to. And with these the company truly will be on course toward its big, red goal.

Falcon Heavy

UPDATED: Space Station supply mission today as SpaceX resumes its CRS schedule.

UPDATE: SpaceX has stuck the landing!  This is first successful Falcon 9 landing at sea, and was shown in real time on the live broadcast.  Congratulations!

SpaceX is sending Dragon to the ISS as it resumes its schedule of resupply missions.  The CRS-8 mission will launch shortly - 4:43 PM EDT (Apr 8, 2016).  As usual for CRS missions, the launch will be from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

Once again, the Falcon 9 will attempt to land on the droneship “Of Course I Still Love You” (in the Atlantic Ocean).  These landings are always experimental and secondary to the main mission, but still highly anticipated.  A landing has yet to be made to a droneship, but a successful landing to the Cape Canaveral landing site was accomplished (and was fantastic to watch!), so a success at sea is not at all out of the realm of possibility.  SpaceX has been getting closer and closer.

As a reminder to those familiar with the Dragon resupply missions (or for those of you that haven't previously followed these missions), SpaceX is the only space station resupply vendor that is able to return relatively large amounts of cargo back from the ISS.  Other CRS missions send cargo to the ISS, but since the retirement of the space shuttle there has been a void in the capability to return significant amounts of cargo.

Live feed (and replay) at http://www.spacex.com/webcast
Press kit is at http://www.spacex.com/press/2016/04/07/press-kit-crs-8-dragon-mission

SpaceX Falcon 9 sticks the landing!

SpaceX just accomplished what they have been building up to for years.  They have successfully brought the Falcon 9 booster back to earth and landed it on their new landing site.

The is truly an exceptional feat, and ushers in the beginning of a new era in space flight.  An era where valuable time and resources are recovered and put back into service instead of being dumped into the ocean.

Congratulations!!

[Update - Video of the landing from the landing pad (from the webcast) and a short aerial view taken from a helicopter]

Test fire of the upgraded Falcon 9

[Dec. 18th] Update: The test firing of the Falcon 9 was completed, and the is data being analyzed.

Elon Musk tweeted:

"Falcon 9 is vertical on the launch pad at Cape Canaveral. Working towards static fire. Deep cryo liquid oxygen presenting some challenges."

It is very encouraging to see a Falcon back on the pad. Hopefully any issues - such as the "deep cryo" LOX fueling (part of the the new Falcon's "densified propellant") - can be sorted quickly in order to have plenty of time to test fire the engines and analyze the data. I don't think this would be the time to rush the process. This flight is important for getting the company back into full swing again, and I'm hopeful about watching a great launch on Sunday. But I wouldn't be surprised if it has to be delayed either, considering the new challenges that inevitably arise with any changes to the vehicle. But the thing that makes SpaceX so exciting is that they keep pushing and are continually moving forward.

Which brings me to what has always been a couched as a secondary goal of recent Falcon launches - landing it in one piece. There have been astonishing close attempts, with each getting closer and closer. And while the payday is earned by hurtling payloads into orbit, having a rocket as big as Falcon hurtle back from space and land itself would be a huge success. And one that would bring a big competitive advantage to SpaceX. There is speculation that the company may be attempting a landing on, well, land. Previous attempts have targeted a platform at sea (the "autonomous spaceport drone ship"), which I assume was to prove it could consistently hit a reasonably small target for safely reasons. But it can do that now, so if the FAA issues a landing permit they seem poised to give it a go.  They've obtained a landing site at the cape designated Landing Complex 1.

So, here's hoping the next few days are fruitful.

SpaceX to test fire the upgraded Falcon 9 in preparation for a possible December 19th launch

[Update] Current schedule is looking at a two hour launch window from 8:25 p.m. to 11:26 p.m. EST this Sunday, December 19th.  Launch site is SLC-40, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida.

According to the recent tweet from Elon Musk, "Aiming for Falcon rocket static fire at Cape Canaveral on the 16th and launch about three days later", it would appear that SpaceX and all the other involved parties are satisfied with the investigation of the CRS-7 mission failure in June.

The Falcon 9 static test fire will be conducted on the pad and is a prelude to a possible launch on December 19th. Following the test fire, engineers will review the all of the data, and if everything checks out an attempt can be made during the three hour launch window that opens at 8:25 p.m. EST (0125 GMT on Dec. 20). The launch will attempt to deploy 11 second-generation Orbcomm (OG2) communications satellites, delayed several times from its initial December 2014 schedule.

The SpaceX team has been making steady progress in preparing Falcon for it's return to duty. The struts that hold the pressurized tanks in place have been scrutinized and no doubt upgraded, being that they were implicated as the apparent cause of the launches failure. According to Elon Musk, "the likely cause was a broken bracket holding a high-pressure helium reservoir inside the Falcon 9’s second stage liquid oxygen tank. The strut apparently fractured under the stresses of launch, causing the helium tank to break free and rupture the upper stage while the first stage was still firing about two minutes after liftoff".

But, as always, the company is not standing still, and has changed the booster to provide a 33-percent increase in performance according to SpaceX's Lee Rosen (Vice President of Mission and Launch Operations). The slightly taller Falcon 9 "has the same engines that we’ve flown before, but with some upgrades and things like that to increase reliability and performance" according to Mr. Rosen. The upgraded Falcon 9 was test fired on Sept. 21st as can be seen in this video. Sited among the changes are increases in the thrust of both the first and second stages, modifications to the landing legs and grid fins (most likely to increase the chances for a successful landing), and many more tweaks. Contributing to the increased thrust is "densified propellant" - chilling the RP-1 fuel more in order to pack more fuel into the same space.

A return to operations will mean that SpaceeX will be able to chip away at it's mounting launch manifest (which was heavily loaded even before the almost half a year hiatus), with several space station resupply missions to make up in addition to the backlog of commercial launches. However, prior to the failed June mission, the company was demonstrating record turn around times, and so if all goes well it has the ability to get a lot of cargo into space in a relative short amount of time. And, with the successful November 23rd flight of the Blue Origin suborbital rocket - which landed safely after reaching the 100-kilometer (62-mile) boundary with space, the desire to stick the landing with the Falcon 9 rocket has to be an increasing important goal. One that the has been getting closer and closer each flight.

Another hop for SpaceX's Grasshopper

As I wrote in early November, the SpaceX Grasshopper project will be making increasing longer "hops" as the company works through the process of developing "full and rapid rocket reusability".  The goal being to maximize reuse - in order to lower costs - and to do so in a manner that will allow the rocket to be rapidly readied for subsequent flights.
The rocket will utilize vertical takeoff and landing vehicle (VTVL) capabilities that rely on sophisticated closed loop thrust vector and throttle control systems.  The most recent test, conducted on December 17th, lasted 29 seconds with the rocket rising 131 feet (40 meters) - equivalent to 12 stories - before hovering and landing safely on the pad.  Quite a feat considering the rocket itself is 10 stories tall.  The video is below, and the press release is on SpaceX's update site.