From the what we’ve all wanted to do: “launch an electric car into space” department. Live video feed below. SpaceX is now targeting the launch time at 2:50PM EST.
SpaceX is counting down the launch of the Falcon Heavy demonstration mission now from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) (yes the one that launched men to the moon on Apollo’s SaturnV booster) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The primary launch window opens at 1:30 p.m. EST, or 18:30 UTC, and closes at 4:00 p.m. EST, or 21:00 UTC. A backup launch window opens on Wednesday, February 7 at 1:30 p.m. EST, or 18:30 UTC, and closes at 4:00 p.m. EST, or 21:00 UTC.
When Falcon Heavy lifts off, it will be the most powerful operational rocket in the world by a factor of two, with the ability to lift more than twice the payload of the next vehicle, at one-third the cost. Only the Saturn V moon rocket, last flown in 1973, delivered more payload to orbit.
Three cores make up the first stage of Falcon Heavy. The side cores, or boosters, are connected to the center core at its base and at the vehicle’s interstage. With a total of 27 Merlin engines, Falcon Heavy’s three cores are capable of generating more than 5 million pounds of thrust.
For this test flight, Falcon Heavy’s two side cores are both flight-proven. One launched the Thaicom 8 satellite in May 2016 and the other supported the CRS-9 mission in July 2016. SpaceX will attempt to land all three of Falcon Heavy’s first stage cores during this test. Following booster separation, Falcon Heavy’s two side cores will attempt to land at SpaceX’s Landing Zones 1 and 2 (LZ-1 and LZ-2) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. Falcon Heavy’s center core will attempt to land on the “Of Course I Still Love You” droneship, which will be stationed in the Atlantic Ocean.
The payload for Falcon Heavy’s demonstration mission is SpaceX CEO and Lead Designer Elon Musk’s midnight-cherry Tesla Roadster. (no, really, this is not a joke)
Demonstration missions like this one typically carry steel or concrete blocks as mass simulators, but SpaceX decided it would be more worthwhile to launch something fun and without irreplaceable sentimental value: a red Roadster for the red planet. Following launch, Falcon Heavy’s second stage will attempt to place the Roadster into a precessing Earth-Mars elliptical orbit around the sun.
It’s important to remember that this mission is a test flight. Even if SpaceX does not complete all of the experimental milestones that are being attempted during this test, we will still be gathering critical data throughout the mission. Ultimately, a successful demonstration mission will be measured by the quality of information gathered to improve the launch vehicle.
Watch it LIVE:
Last night, I posed this question/poll on Twitter:
#FalconHeavyLaunch on Tuesday will be:
— Watts Up With That (@wattsupwiththat) February 6, 2018
Mission Timeline (all times approximate)
COUNTDOWN
Hour/Min/Sec Events
– 01:28:00 SpaceX Launch Director verifies go for propellant load
– 01:25:00 RP-1 (rocket grade kerosene) loading underway
– 00:45:00 LOX (liquid oxygen) loading underway
– 00:07:00 Falcon Heavy begins engine chill prior to launch
– 00:01:00 Flight computer commanded to begin final prelaunch checks
– 00:01:00 Propellant tank pressurization to flight pressure begins
– 00:00:45 SpaceX Launch Director verifies go for launch
– 00:00:05 Engine controller commands side booster engine ignition sequence to start
– 00:00:03 Engine controller commands center core engine ignition sequence to start 00:00:00 Falcon Heavy liftoff
LAUNCH, LANDINGS AND ORBITAL INSERTION
Hour/Min/Sec Events
00:01:06 Max Q (moment of peak mechanical stress on the rocket) 00:02:29 Booster engine cutoff (BECO)
00:02:33 Side cores separate from center core
00:02:50 Side cores begin boostback burn
00:03:04 Center core engine shutdown/main engine cutoff (MECO) 00:03:07 Center core and 2nd stage separate
00:03:15 2nd stage engine starts
00:03:24 Center core begins boostback burn
00:03:49 Fairing deployment
00:06:41 Side cores begin entry burn
00:06:47 Center core begins entry burn
00:07:58 Side core landings
00:08:19 Center core landing
00:08:31 2nd stage engine cutoff (SECO-1)
00:28:22 2nd stage engine restarts
00:28:52 2nd stage engine cutoff (SECO-2)
Mission continues on an experimental long coast and third stage two burn to target a precessing Earth-Mars elliptical orbit around the sun
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Well: If successful we all know what to do with our Teslas when the lights go out.
Love it. Science can be fun and think of all that CO2 wafting into space. WOW!,
From the article: “When Falcon Heavy lifts off, it will be the most powerful operational rocket in the world by a factor of two, with the ability to lift more than twice the payload of the next vehicle, at one-third the cost. Only the Saturn V moon rocket, last flown in 1973, delivered more payload to orbit.”
Well, that depends on what you call “payload”. The Space Shuttle launch system could put a payload of one space shuttle at 100 tons, and 30 tons of cargo in Low Earth Orbit for a total of 130 tons to LEO, as compared to Musk’s heavy-lift vehicle rated at 70 tons to LEO.
A billionaire in a hurry to push space development could have bought the Space Shuttle Launch System from NASA and been way ahead of the game. You could put reusable boosters on this system, too.
Except that the SLS:
1. Is years away.
2. Costs 3/4 of a billion a pop.
3. Will launch at most twice a year… And they only have enough engines for a total (Including tests) of 8 Launches… NASA has indicated that they might think about asking for funding for more engines…. Now that is commitment!
He’s talking about the Space Shuttle, not the future SLS.
Space shuttle is old technology. It was a bad design from the beginning. Tried to be all things to all people and ended up being so so at a lot of things while being good at nothing.
TA
You are correct sir.
Looks like a scrub anyway. I don’t remember ever launching when we were on hold for upper level winds. They just don’t change that fast
They did succeed in shutting down the Space Coast. Can’t move with all the traffic.
Reusable boosters, yes. But, you still will need a motor platform attached to the external tank to reach orbit. The other issue is the structure was designed to “piggy-back” an orbiter with the CG in a specific location.
I suppose you could redesign the external fuel tank to carry a newly designed payload/propulsion vehicle (heck, lets make this reusable too, but leave off the wings).
So new boosters, new ET, new payload/propulsion vehicle. Hmm…what have we reused from the SSLS we bought?
BTW you don’t book-keep the delivery vehicle as payload. And, the SSLS couldn’t go beyond LEO.
So um…no a rich billionaire couldn’t.
“So new boosters, new ET, new payload/propulsion vehicle. Hmm…what have we reused from the SSLS we bought?”
Don’t need new boosters. They would be nice, but remember the bilionaire is in a hurry, so he’ll just use the solid rocket boosters initially.
Yes, we need a new External Tank (ET), but we can get one from the manufacturer (had this deal been done right after the space shuttles were retired).
Don’t need a new propulsion vehicle, we’ll just use the space shuttle we bought from NASA.
So what does a billionaire in a hurry to get humans into space do? He contracts to attach a 15-foot-long by 27.5-foot-diameter, habitation module to the bottom of the ET and then he launches the space shuttle into orbit with an empty cargobay, and in this configuration the space shuttle can hang on to the ET instead of dumping it back into the atmosphere, and the space shuttle has enough power to put itself and the ET with module attached into Low Earth Orbit. The empty ET can be used as living/working space once in orbit. Huge volumes!
One more launch of the space shuttle delivers the solar panels and some additional hardward to the ET and you have a completed space station that is 168 feet long and 27.5 feet in diameter with a volume larger than the international space station.
In two space shuttle launches you have matched what it took NASA decades and over $100 billion to accomplish.
This ET space station design was actually one of the official designs submitted to NASA as a possible space station back in the 1990’s. It was called Option C. The cost of the ET space station was estimated to be about $5 billion back then. As compared to the international space station program with a cost of over $100 billion (the original estimate for Option A was $16 to $20 billion).
Put two more of these ET space stations around/on the Moon and around Mars, and you have a real live space development program. Each one would cost about $5 billion in 1990’s dollars.
So if you want to develop new technology, then develop new technology. But if a billionaire wanted to jumpstart a space development program he should have bought the Space Shuttle launch system for a song from NASA. He could have kept a lot of contractors in business and could probably get a price break from them to boot.
And for deep space development, you need a lot of propellant to get things to the Moon and to Mars and for that job a rocket that can put 130 tons (minus the cargo carrier) in Low Earth Orbit beats a rocket that can put 70 tons in Low Earth Orbit.
Unfortunately, noone saw the sense in using the ET this way, and now it’s too late, but the Space Shuttle Launch system, with its huge External Tank, was the perfect configuration for space development. No other vehicle could/can put a 153 ft. long, 27.5 ft diameter module in orbit, including Mr. Musk’s Falcon Heavy.
But we just threw that opportunity away. I attribute it to a lack of vision on the part of people who could have made a difference.
I’m all for private enterprise in space. It’s the only way to go. Goverments are too unwieldy and have other priorities than doing the fastest, most efficient job possible. But it’s a damn shame we didn’t use the Space Shuttle the way it should have been used. We could have gotten a *lot* more bang for our buck if we had done it right.
Since the orbiter was *required* to come back, it can’t be counted as payload. As a customer, the most I could expect to be delivered to orbit was 30 tons, so that’s the maximum payload to orbit. FH is more than twice that at less than half the cost per launch.
If this escapade is successful, I expect he will change the company name to “Space-sex”.
3×9 = 27 engines that all have to light and perform flawlessly … hmmm .. isn’t that what killed the Russian man-on-the-moon program?
https://jalopnik.com/this-insane-rocket-is-why-the-soviet-union-never-made-i-1448356326
Russians had the rockets to go. This setback didn’t keep them from trying. U.S. had several.
The loss of one or two rockets won’t endanger the ship. It will just mean it won’t make as high an orbit.
Beyond that, I suspect that they only plan on operating the engines at 80 to 90% capacity. In which case the loss of an engine or two can be compensated for by increasing the power on the remaining engines.
Depends of course,, whether the “loss” of one or more of the rockets simply “stops” the rocket from firing, or stops a turbo pump or plugs a relief vent valve for whatever. Or never permitted the busted engine from lighting off at all.
Or whether that failed turbo pump means a busted pipe or broken pressurized fuel tank which is now spewing tens of thousands of gallons of unburned fuel and oxidizer inside the fuselage around all of the remaining rocket engines.
Of course, any explosion below the Tesla will merely lift the Tesla a few thousand more feet higher. Temporarily higher.
Its all in what are known as “failure modes”, or essentially what happens if this fails.
The Russian rockets had a catastrophic failure mode that caused “fratricidal” effects. That a nice way of saying when one failed, it blew-up and killed the others around it…which blew up and killed….
We attempt to design our engines with graceful failure modes, and as such they just shut down. Of course that usually means failure of the launch, but the reliability is better. However as you assert single point failure (SPF) reliability is an issue especially if it is in a chain. That is why we require SPF components to be .99999 reliable. It is a multiplicative chain, so only 99% reliable won’t cut it. In a simple 3 SPF event (.99 x .99 x .99) which would make the overall system only 97% reliable.
Despite my snarking above, I do want to see this succeed. We need to stop using Russia’s space program as a launch platform and get out of the Spacelab business. We should long since had something besides those rovers on Mars already. Mars is having one of its usual 12-month summer dust storms now, which would be a good opportunity to test the volume of water vapor stirred up from the ground level. (See Sky & Telescope for more details on this news.)
If Elon Musk wants to go galloping off into space and make it a commercial success, fine by me. Should have happened long ago, the very moment the government cut funding for such things and started paying the Russians for the launches. If this succeeds, we should have Moonbase Lunar One within ten years.
Elon’s life long plan is to go to Mars, and everything he does is geared to achieve that goal. So you should be cheering him on Sara.
I think some mis-heard “launch time” as “lunch time”.
They’re running the Lunch checklist.
2:40 PM EST. This copied from the NASA launch video site:
Looks like it’s a definite go.
3:24 EST.
SpaceX web site was only showing a video stream for a while, but has just starting its actual feed.
Here’s a little pre-flight music, as we’re awaiting final approval for departure….
Frank Sinatra – Come Fly With Me!
https://youtu.be/HmQq6yLe2ww
Who would want to live on Mars.
Maybe somebody who scraps out Teslas with a few micrometeor dings.
Won’t the tires blow off this thing as soon as it hits 10 millibars or so? Good luck finding replacement tires on Mars, and Tirerack.com doesn’t ship free to there.
I’ll bet cabin fever would be the biggest problem.
“Mars ain’t the kind of place to raise your kids
In fact it’s cold as hell
And there’s no one there to raise them if you did”
Rocket Man by Elton John
LP1= ‘Clean’ Kerosene
Space-X Heavy is fossil fueled!
What else is that energy dense, yet that easy and relatively safe to deploy?
I wonder if he might have considered sending my ’95 Ram pickup into space and giving me the roadster…
Go Baby! Go Baby! Go Baby! GO!
Frank Sinatra – Fly Me To The Moon!
https://youtu.be/QKhcTfskXJ4
You win the music choice award.
Wow, nothing like that long shot of the launch pad area with the rocket coming out of the plume on a pillar of flame!
I’ll have to say, despite my misgivings, that was a very impressive launch, insertion, and recovery.
3X rockets launched, 2X back on the ground, 1 more might be OK out on the mid-ocean raft.
2nd stage burn OK = Car in orbit.
Not a bad day. Just don’t know yet if that 3rd rocket made it down OK. Antennas were reported dead – possibly from vibration on landing. Could be exploded as well.
But consider the return-to-ground. Essentially, you’re facing two V-2 rockets returning back towards the launch pad. And can only “hope” that neither fails – controls, restart of the rocket, false start of the rocket, bad guidance, blown up tank or bad controller – so that it returns as an actual IRBM on your head.
Watching the boosters land like that…VERY cool
That twin booster landing was unreal! It looked like something out of Star Trek, not real life! Wow!
For years I sneered at the naivete of 1950’s sci fi movie makers with their rockets landing back on the ground, inspired by 1930’s Golden Age fiction. Now, all I can say is…you guys called it.
You aren’t the only one D.J., I was a doubter too, but SpaceX has made me a believer. I’m excited about space travel again!
I grew up watching Apollo launches, and later Shuttle launches. I must say this Falcon Heavy launch was impressive, and I’m really glad it was successful
Wow. That was amazing to watch. I actually teared up at times.
The dual landing of the boosters was absolutely spectacular.
Watching while sitting down leaves one thinking this can’t actually be true. Everyone should have had an emotional reaction.
If they could have just landed the main booster successfully near-by, it would have left a viewer speechless. It already got there in my opinion.
Not a fan of the Tesla cars, but SpaceX is the real deal.
Looks like a ‘bases loaded home run’ for Space-X and the USA!
Hot Damn! We’re Baa-aaack!
The marketing shots of ‘Starman’ in the top-off Tesla, with beautiful blue earth in the back ground is true marketing genius! Didn’t see that one coming….
That was cool! Good job SpaceX!
The simultaneous landing of those two boosters was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen (as someone born post-Apollo)
Does anyone have a video shot by a third party of those two boosters landing? There has to be since they supposedly landed from they took off. The video I watched looked totally fake.
The synchronized landing of the first two boosters – Space Ballet at its finest!
Yeah, that was something else — reminded me of some sci-fi movie-scene from long ago, can’t remember which.
Looked like video game graphics to me
Talk to somebody that was there, man. You can’t fake something so public.
If people watched the two boosters land, there will be video of it. I would like to see it. THe video I saw was CGI
I easily found some independent videos of the twin booster landings on youtube. Here’s one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMCC0iigRWI
And here’s another from a different perspective:
I’ll leave it up to you to find more. I’m sure in the coming days there will be a lot more posted online; enough even to satisfy most skeptics. Only the tin-foil hat brigade will still claim they are all CGI.
An object can’t fall from the sky at that speed and not suffer damage. Also the dust clouds kicked up by those objects don’t match the dust clouds in the CGI video that the Musk team put out.
In the second video the two objects do not touchdown at the same time. They are also descending slower than the other videos. That video actually looks more realistic.
Man, that took me back to Mr. Stern’s classroom, all of us sitting in our seats, waiting for the ‘GO’ on Freedom 7. We were on our way. Then we go to the Moon and back more than once, and then – well, space is an extremely high risk job.
Now we’re back!
Thank you, Elon Musk!
P.S. The car shots were cool stuff, too. I hope the battery lasts long enough to get some really good stuff from that car.
Got up at 3am in the morning here in Australia only to find it delayed. The wait was so worth it though. Truly one of the most amazing and inspiring things I’ve seen in spaceflight in a long long time. The 2 boosters synchonized landing was so very cool.