SpaceX's Quest to Reduce Launch Costs and Increase Lifetime 39, access to the space will continue. The darkness of Sunday morning when a Falcon 9 upgrade rocket jumps a commercial communications satellite from Cape Canaveral, then performs an automatic return on a ship in the Atlantic Ocean.

If schedules are maintained, the latest version of the 9-engine 9-engine Falcon 9 from California, known as Block 5, will take its second mission from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 40 during a launch window which opens at 1.50 am and ends at 5 am: 50 pm

On board: Telstar 19 VANTAGE, a communications spacecraft operated by Telesat, a Canadian company, and built in California, which will focus on the Americas with broadband and other services. Falcon 9 will launch the 15,600-pound satellite into a geostationary transfer orbit, which means the spacecraft will use its own propulsion to reach its final fixed position thousands of kilometers above the equator.

Launch of a second Block 5 Falcon 9 final version of the rocket, brings SpaceX, based in California, closer to its ultimate goal: to transport the people and equipment needed to build a self-sustaining civilization on Mars. The CEO of the company, Elon Musk, believes that the reuse of rockets – the landing engines, the most expensive parts of rocket engines and their repackaging – will ultimately increase the rate of launch, reduce costs and bring to SpaceX its red planet ambitions.

SpaceX has three computer-controlled booster options after a launch that launches the reusability process:

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– S & There is enough fuel, the mission profile may call a return to the landing site, or RTLS, which means that the thruster will automatically find its way and will land a few kilometers from the place where he detached himself. To date, SpaceX has made only landings at Cape Canaveral, but future coastal landings are expected at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California this year

– If less fuel is left, the teams can meet the booster halfway. launch site and its separation from the second stage of the rocket: the ocean. The company operates two drone ships, of course, I still love you for the east coast and just read the instructions for the west coast, which give a house to the boosters before they can be returned to a nearby port. A third drone, called A Shortfall of Gravitas, is being built for use on the East Coast

– so almost all the fuel is spent and the rocket does not have enough to get back to Earth or a drone ship, SpaceX leads what is called an "expendable" mission. After the separation of the second stage and the spacecraft, the thruster will be rejected in the Atlantic or Pacific oceans.

Musk targets 10 flights of Blocks 5 with little or no refurbishment between missions, but the rocket will be capable of 100 flights with moderate work, which means that SpaceX will probably require only 30 to 40 boosters for the next few years as its next-generation rocket is developed.

"The key to Block 5 is that it is designed to do 10 or more flights without any planned refit between the flight," Musk told reporters in May. "The only thing that needs to change is to reload the propellant and fly again."

SpaceX increases in-flight availability but will not pose a problem – The company has accumulated dozens of spacecraft, ranging from commercial defense to national defense, which must be launched. Historically, satellite operators have reached a bottleneck after the construction of their spacecraft and would have to wait months or years before the rockets are available.

About $ 50 million per launch, or about $ 10 million less Falcon 9, Block 5s is expected to help the company increase its rate of transition to the Big Falcon Rocket (19459041), or BFR . The massive moon and Mars-bound vehicles currently under development are predicted to be more powerful multitudes and more than 100 feet taller than Falcon 9, which is usually about 230 feet high on the launch pad

version of Falcon 9 before BFR, "said Musk, noting later that BFR will be built at the port of Los Angeles California before being transported to the Florida space coast. "Expect this to be a mainstay of SpaceX's business."

The ambitions of Bloc 5 do not stop there: after several flights with the improvements, NASA should certify the rocket to fly crews from the American soil to the International. Space Station, an achievement not accomplished since the end of the space shuttle program exactly seven years ago. But before that, SpaceX must launch its Dragon Crew capsule without astronauts during an automated demonstration mission aboard the ISS and bring it back for a safe dive into the Pacific Ocean. Demonstration Mission 1 is expected in August, while the first crewed mission could take place as of the end of the year or early next year

Boeing, also selected as part of NASA's $ 6.8 billion commercial crew program to take astronauts aboard the ISS, also needs to demonstrate the safety of its Starliner spacecraft with unmanned demonstration flights. For Sunday's launch, forecasters at Patrick's 45th Air Force Meteorological Squadron predict that cumulus clouds and thick clouds could extend over Cape Canaveral during the window, meaning that 60% of them they will take off. The long window will work in SpaceX's favor – teams can use these four hours to launch during a break in the cloud cover.

Contact Emre Kelly at [email protected] or 321-242-3715. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook on @EmreKelly

Launch Sunday

• Rocket: SpaceX Falcon 9
• Mission: Telstar 19 VANTAGE Satellite Communications
• Time launch: 1:50 am
• Launching Window: 5:50 am
• Launching Complex: 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Station
• Landing: Of course, I still love you drone ship
• Weather : 60% "go"

Join FloridaToday.com/Space/ for countdown updates and chat at 1am Sunday, including streaming SpaceX launch webcast starting about 15 minutes before lift-off.

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