Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

Dev.SN ♥ developers

Next Falcon 9 to Attempt Soft Splashdown

posted by Dopefish on Friday February 21 2014, @01:00PM   Printer-friendly
from the rocket-kits-are-awesome-these-days dept.

WildWombat writes:

"nasaspaceflight.com reports that the next Falcon 9 flight will attempt a soft splashdown off the coast of Florida to test its newly installed landing legs. If successful, this will be a major step along the path to a reusable rocket.

The flight, CRS-3, is an ISS resupply mission scheduled for March 16th. The pace of SpaceX technology development is truly impressive."

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Next Falcon 9 to Attempt Soft Splashdown | Log In/Create an Account | Top | 1000 moderator points   | 18 comments | Search Discussion
Display Options Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.

  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by cmn32480 on Friday February 21 2014, @03:26PM

    by cmn32480 (443) on Friday February 21 2014, @03:26PM (#4488) Journal

    I am no rocket scientist, and I apologize for the very basic question.

    What, exactly, is the purpose of the landing legs? Is it really as simple as I think it is, like landing on the moon with the legs on the lunar module?

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +1  
       Interesting=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Interesting' Modifier   0  
    Total Score:   2  

  • (Score: 4, Informative) by kanisae on Friday February 21 2014, @03:46PM

    by kanisae (1908) on Friday February 21 2014, @03:46PM (#4498)

    SpaceX wants their rockets to be fully re-usable, so the purpose of the legs is exactly that, to land land the rocket after launch.

  • (Score: 2, Informative) by amblivious on Friday February 21 2014, @03:55PM

    by amblivious (26) on Friday February 21 2014, @03:55PM (#4502)

    The addition of landing legs is one of the steps on the path to building a fully reusable rocket.

  • (Score: 5, Informative) by WildWombat on Friday February 21 2014, @04:22PM

    by WildWombat (1428) on Friday February 21 2014, @04:22PM (#4521)

    Yes. This flight they are going to test the leg deployment and make sure they can land softly and accurately. Once they've proven that the system works they'll attempt landings on solid ground instead of water. They want to be able to reuse the first stage and this is a step in that direction. This has always been a goal of SpaceX and they designed the rocket and the engines with re-usability in mind.

    Cheers,
    -WW

  • (Score: 5, Informative) by sar on Friday February 21 2014, @05:12PM

    by sar (507) on Friday February 21 2014, @05:12PM (#4548)
    There is video with test flight demonstrating this cool technology: http://www.space.com/23193-spacex-grasshopper-rock et-highest-hop-video.html [space.com]

  • (Score: 1) by tibman on Friday February 21 2014, @08:18PM

    by tibman (134) on Friday February 21 2014, @08:18PM (#4620)

    The rocket legs will be mostly used for crushing every competing rocket system ever designed. Instead of just crashing back to earth the rocket will land!

    --
    SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.