Elon Musk’s vision of reusing rockets for cheaper spaceflight has received a major boost, with a SpaceX Falcon 9 first stage being successfully flown on a second mission.
(Credit: SpaceX)
Having first been used on a resupply mission to the ISS in April last year, the Falcon 9 in question was refurbished over a four-month period. Less than a year later, the first stage was used to launch the SES-10 communications satellite – built by Airbus Defence and Space – from Cape Canaveral into geostationary orbit. The 5,300kg Ku-band satellite will provide broadcast coverage and internet connectivity over Latin America.
As well as successfully launching the payload, SpaceX was also able to recover the Falcon 9’s first stage for a second time. The booster landed on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You, floating down range from the Kennedy Space Centre in the Atlantic Ocean.
According to Gwynne Shotwell, president and COO of SpaceX, while this first refurbishment took place over four months, the ultimate goal is to be able to reuse rockets on the same day. The company is currently working on a final iteration of the Falcon 9, which is due to fly its first mission later this year. Shotwell says this latest version is being designed to re-launch multiple times.
“The final vehicle design spin that we are doing on Falcon 9, that we will be flying later this year, that should be capable of up to 10 or even more (launches),” she said.
Speaking at a post-flight press conference, SpaceX founder Elon Musk expressed his joy at successfully reusing the Falcon 9 for the first time.
“It’s been 15 years to get to this point,” he said. “It’s taken us a long time, a lot of difficult steps along with way, but I am just incredibly proud of the SpaceX team for being able to achieve this incredible milestone in the history of space.”
What does “refurbishment” mean? If it is substantially the same parts, it’s great, but not if it’s a refurbished broom with a new head and a new handle. It would be interesting to get a feel for the cost of refurbishment as a fraction of the cost of a new rocket.
I would assume that, because this is the first time that they have done this, that the booster was essentially stripped down, inspected in minute detail and reassembled with some of the progressive improvements that have been developed. They are developing the final version, Block-5, and that will be the final major version of the first stage. They will no doubt do the same for this one to see if the second flight has caused any issues. One thing they have mentioned is replacing the present aluminium grid fins with titanium ones. As we saw yesterday they get very hot. Having achieved this goal they announced long term goals to recover the 2nd stage and also to speed up the turnaround time, though I think one day is a rather out-there expectation!
Even if ‘refurbishment’ saves money in the long run – I’m still not sure about the advantages of returning the launcher to earth vertically – surely gliding it down would be cheaper and less complex, less risky, more flexible and a lot less weight?
Richard,
If you have a few spare minutes, watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PULkWGHeIQQ
Its a One-on-one with Elon Musk at MIT from 2014. At 04:30 use of wings vs retro rockets is discussed. Basically issues are as Neil MacKinnon mentioned and also while wings / parachutes work on Earth, they are not an option for soft landing humans on Mars or other bodies with no or almost no atmosphere.
The aim is that improvements in the design will remove the ‘refurbishment’ aspects to zero – as mentioned above – allow a very quick turnaround time (less than a day, at least for the first 10 flights). Just an educated guess here – but the advantage of a vertical landing is more options with a compact landing site than coming in at a glide which would require a lengthy runway … also no need for additional flight surfaces/controls that would add weight to the design and therefore reduce payload to space.