- Joined
- Mar 20, 2014
- Messages
- 418
Latest launch, another pin point landing. Yeeeeeehah!
They are making a successful business of launching satellites and getting paid for it. Landing the stages will allow reuse and reduce costs. In the mean time, SLS doesn't even exist yet.I've never really understood the whole purpose of this project. It can't compete with the SLS, so I don't see what they hope to accomplish with it.
They are routinely putting communication satellites in GEO. They sent a NASA spacecraft to L2: the second stage went into solar orbit. The Falcon Heavy, scheduled to launch this fall, will have nearly three times the capacity of the Falcon 9. SpaceX already has contracts to launch DoD satellites and routinely sends cargo spacecraft to the ISS (and returns them to Earth for reuse). SLS will only be used for large interplanetary missions: it will be far too expensive for anything else. SpaceX's planned BFR will have a much larger payload than SLS or even Saturn V.Yea, but if memory serves even the heaviest version of SpaceX has less lifting capacity than the lightest version of SLS. I also seem to remember them having a limit on how high of an orbit they can achieve.
Can anyone enlighten me as to why the choose to land on a barge at sea
rather than on land, like the "other lot" do.
I agree though, when I saw the first controlled landing on land, I though it was a huge breakthrough, and TBH never thought they would crack this barge landing. What do they do if the weather cuts up rough at sea?