SpaceX Landed the Falcon Heavy's Two Boosters, But Its Core Clipped Its Drone Ship at 300 MPH
Source: Gizmodo
SpaceX Landed the Falcon Heavy's Two Boosters, But Its Core Clipped Its Drone Ship at 300 MPH
Tom McKay
Yesterday 11:40pm Filed to: IT WILL BE MISSED
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy launch went pretty well this afternoon, with the rocket’s two partially reusable Falcon 9 strap-on boosters making successful landings at Kennedy Air Force Station after jettisoning from the craft three minutes post-launch. However, the rocket’s center core did not function as founder Elon Musk and team intended, and appears to have later crashed back down to Earth. Hard.
Per the Verge, after breaking away from its upper stage (the portion of the Falcon Heavy carrying its Tesla Roadster payload), the core experienced engine problems. It didn’t quite miss the remotely piloted ship where it was supposed to land, exactly, but neither the core or the ship survived intact:
The center core was only able to relight one of the three engines necessary to land, and so it hit the water at 300 miles per hour. Two engines on the drone ship were taken out when it crashed, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said in a press call after the rocket launch.
Link to tweet
According to Engadget, Musk said the core landed some 100 meters from the ship but that a massive spray of shrapnel did indeed make contact. There apparently may be video of the crash, but Musk said that depends on if “the cameras didn’t get blown up as well.”
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Read more: https://gizmodo.com/spacex-recovered-the-falcon-heavys-two-boosters-but-it-1822788896
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