SpaceX Falcon Rocket Takes Off From Florida in Debut Test Flight
The 23-story tall Falcon Heavy roared off its launch pad at 3:45 pm EST at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
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A new SpaceX jumbo rocket in line to become the world's most powerful launch vehicle in operation blasted off from Florida on Tuesday, 6 February in its debut test launch.
The 23-story tall Falcon Heavy roared off its launch pad at 3:45 pm EST (2045 GMT) at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, from the same site used by NASA's towering Saturn 5 rockets to carry Apollo missions to the moon more than 40 years ago.
SpaceX's new heavy-lift rocket, the Falcon Heavy, was launched for the first time on 6 February, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said in a tweet.
Falcon Heavy’s lift off from NASA's historic launch pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida is set to be the most powerful operational rocket in the world by a factor of two, Reuters reported.
The launchpad that hoisted men to the Moon almost 50 years ago underwent modifications by SpaceX to adapt it to the needs of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.
Musk had tweeted news of the Falcon Heavy’s launch in late January.
The Falcon Heavy is a reusable super heavy-lift launch vehicle. Its first stage is composed of three Falcon 9 nine-engine cores whose 27 Merlin engines together generate more than 5 million pounds (2.3 million kg) of thrust at liftoff, equal to about eighteen 747 aircrafts.
Only the Saturn V moon rocket, last flown in 1973, delivered a larger payload to the orbit. The Falcon Heavy was designed from the outset to carry humans into space and restores the possibility of flying missions with crew to the Moon or Mars, according to SpaceX.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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