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SpaceX Sets Inaugural Launch of Falcon 1 on Nov. 25 |
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EL SEGUNDO, Calif., Nov. 21, 2005/Satnews Daily/ ¾ Private launch firm SpaceX said on Friday its Falcon 1 rocket will have its maiden flight to space on Friday, Nov. 25. The Falcon 1 rocket will begin its journey to orbit, accelerating to 17,000 mph (twenty-five times the speed of sound) in less than ten minutes at 1 p.m. (PDT), SpaceX said.
The launch, the company said, will mark the first privately developed, liquid fueled rocket to reach orbit and the world's first all new orbital rocket in over a decade. The main engine of Falcon 1 (Merlin) will be the first all new American hydrocarbon booster engine to be flown in forty years and only the second new American booster engine of any kind in twenty-five years, SpaceX said.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk said he feels relief for the coming launch. “No matter what happens next week, this is something that is the first stepping stone in reducing the cost of access to space,” Musk told reporters during a press conference.
SpaceX is developing a family of launch vehicles intended to increase the reliability and reduce the cost of access to space by a factor of ten. The customer for this mission is DARPA and the Air Force and the payload will be FalconSat-2, part of the Air Force Academy's satellite program that will measure space plasma phenomena, which can adversely affect space-based communications, including GPS and other civil and military communications. The target orbit is 400 km X 500 km (just above the International Space Station) at an inclination of 39 degrees.
Space X added Falcon 1 will enter history books as the only rocket flying 21st century avionics, which require a small fraction of the power and mass of other systems. It will be the world's only semi-reusable orbital rocket apart from the Shuttle (all other launch vehicles are completely expendable).
SpaceX said, Falcon 1, priced at $6.7 million, will provide the lowest cost per flight to orbit of any launch vehicle in the world, despite receiving a design reliability rating equivalent to that of the best launch vehicles currently flying in the United States.
Designed from the ground up by SpaceX, Falcon 1 is a two stage rocket powered by liquid oxygen and purified, rocket grade kerosene. The maiden flight will take place from the Kwajalein Atoll of the Marshall Islands.
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