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SpaceX launched at Falcon 9 rocket Wednesday April 18, 2018, from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
Florida Today

The branch of NASA based on the Kennedy Space Center that works with the market and the launch of the SpaceX's workhorse Falcon 9 rocket for its top missions.

Falcon 9 Block 5, the latest addition to the KSC in May, LSP's Category 3 certification, which enables the company to launch the agency's highest-priority payloads.

Three different criteria, but there are three alternative paths to earn it. Category 3 NASA officials. The more access NASA has the most successful officials in the world.

To date, Falcon 9 Block 5 has flown six successful missions – four from the Space Coast and two from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Including previous versions of Falcon 9, however, which has been reduced to 60 missions with only one post-launch failure.

"LSP Category 3 certification is a major achievement for the Falcon 9 team and another key milestone in our close partnership with NASA," SpaceX President and Chief Operating Officer Gwynne Shotwell said Thursday in a company-released statement. "We are honored to have the opportunity to provide cost-effective and reliable launch services to the country's most important scientific payloads. "

Falcon 9 has already boosted high-priority science payloads, such as this year's launch of NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Satellite Survey, or TESS, and the internationally developed JASON-3 satellite. Both were managed by LSP and were Category 2 missions.

Moving forward, the certification will likely mean NASA and other agencies consider Falcon 9 for more complex and costly science missions.

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

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