A shiny new SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Thursday efficiently lofted the newest army satellite tv for pc to house for the US Area Drive.

Elon Musk’s rocket firm lastly launched the third-generation army GPS satellite tv for pc after a sequence of earlier delays. It was initially set for blastoff in late September however then obtained pushed again a number of days. It got here near lifting off Oct. 2, however the launch was aborted with simply two seconds to go on the countdown clock.

The sudden difficulty led to a couple different delays, notably of NASA’s Crew-1 mission to ship 4 astronauts to the Worldwide Area Station aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, out of concern that the difficulty might crop up on different Merlin engines.

An investigation revealed that a little bit of “masking lacquer” had blocked a reduction valve line, inflicting two of the rocket’s 9 Merlin engines to try to fireplace early. The suspect engines have been swapped out and new launch dates set.

Now the GPS III Area Automobile 04 is on its method to orbit. The primary stage booster used within the launch landed on the droneship Of Course I Nonetheless Love You within the Atlantic Ocean lower than 9 minutes after liftoff. It’s set to make its second flight on one other GPS satellite tv for pc mission in 2021. 

 The corporate can also be anticipated to attempt to recuperate the halves of the fairing or nostril cone utilizing completely different ships. 

The subsequent SpaceX launch is anticipated to be the aforementioned Crew-1 mission for NASA. Liftoff is ready for Nov. 14.

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Watch Starlink 11 launch and Falcon 9 droneship touchdown

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