SpaceX has successfully completed its first
launch of a commercial satellite into geostationary transfer orbit (GTO). This
marks the seventh ever flight of the SpaceX Falcon launch system, and the
second launch of the recently upgraded Falcon 9 v1.1 rocket. Impressively, except for a small glitch on its fourth flight,
SpaceX has retained a perfect launch record. SES actually got a discounted
price from SpaceX for the launch, presumably due to the added risk of this
being the company’s first attempt to reach GTO.
The Falcon 9 rocket launched from SpaceX’s Cape
Canaveral Launch Complex 40 (LC40), a launch pad that was previously used by
the US Air Force to launch Titan rockets, but which SpaceX now leases from the
US government. After the standard 180-second burn of the first stage to propel
the rocket into outer space (around 100km), it detached, allowing the
single-engine second stage to burn for five minutes and 20 seconds, pushing the
payload into a high-altitude parking orbit. 18 minutes later, when various
variables were just right (azimuth, eccentricity, apogee, etc.) the second
stage reignited for a further 60 seconds to place the payload into
geostationary transfer orbit (GTO).
The Falcon 9′s payload was SES-8, a
3170-kilogram (6990lb) communications satellite that will provide extra
bandwidth for rapidly growing markets in south-east Asia and the Indo-China
peninsula. SES-8 is equipped with 33 Ku-band transponders, which is fairly
beefy, but not that crazy (SES-6 has 43 C-band and 48 Ku-band transponders).
Gallium arsenide solar panels provide five kilowatts of power, with two 4,850
watt-hour lithium-ion batteries providing backup power for when the satellite is
in shadow. “The successful insertion of the SES-8 satellite confirms the
upgraded Falcon 9 launch vehicle delivers to the industry’s highest performance
standards,” said SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.
Falcon 9 v1.1 is essentially an upgraded
version of the original Falcon 9, with an overhauled design and more thrust.
Externally, not much has changed, except the nine primary-stage Merlin 1D
rocket engines are arranged in a circular fashion, rather than a square.
Ultimately, v1.1 is another step towards SpaceX’s realization of a reusable
primary stage — a primary stage that, after detaching from the second stage,
can safely land back on the launchpad. The next version of Grasshopper, SpaceX’s vertical-takeoff-and-landing prototype,
will be outfitted with nine engines, just like Falcon 9 — once more testing is
done with Grasshopper v1.1, SpaceX may start landing Falcon 9 rockets by mid-2014.
Falcon 9 v1.1 is also equipped with the
necessary bits to launch manned Dragon capsules into space — to the
International Space Station, for example. So far, though, SpaceX hasn’t signed
any manned space travel contracts with NASA.
