On Thursday, SpaceX
Company says used SpaceX rocket is ready for second liftoff this week
will reuse a rocket booster for the first time and send up a satellite. The satellite company, meanwhile, sees the reuse of rockets as a process that will be routine in the near future.
An executive at a satellite company whose payload is set to ride on the first voyage of a reused SpaceX rocket booster this week says he expects sending up used rockets will become routine within 18 months.
SES chief technology officer Martin Halliwell said he has little worry about this week’s launch, scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday.
“We have been through this (rocket) with a fine-toothed comb,” he said. “SpaceX has been through it with a finetoothed comb. This booster is a really good booster and we are confident.”
SpaceX will send a used Falcon 9 rocket into space carrying a telecommunications satellite from the Space Coast. It will represent the first time the company has done so.
SpaceX has been part of a new group of companies that have been increasing their launch frequency in Florida.
Billionaire CEO Elon Musk in the past has said reusability is the key to developing a way to reaching Mars and called it the “fundamental breakthrough” needed in that effort.
The SES-10 satellite being launched will bolster Internet service and TV signals in Central and South America. In December 2013, the company hitched a ride on SpaceX’s first successful launch of a commercial payload.
“We are on the edge of quite a bit of history here,” Halliwell said. “This is a hugely exciting part of the mission for SES, SpaceX and the industry, in general.”
This week’s mission is a chance for SpaceX to prove that their efforts will pay off after years of work toward reusability, said Justin Karl, program coordinator of Commercial Space Operations at Embry-Riddle.
“SpaceX has been promising this type of reusability for some time now,” Karl said. “They need to show the processes have matured enough for commercial use.”
This week’s launch had been expected to occur in the last part of 2016. But two days after SES officials announced their intention to fly with SpaceX on Aug. 30, a SpaceX rocket exploded on a Florida launch pad, throwing off the company’s schedule.
Halliwell said that accident caused some hesitation.
“Whenever there is a failure, we have some trepidation and we will engage with that launch provider to mitigate that,” he said.
Halliwell said the delay did cost the company money, but they tried to move on quickly once they were reassured by SpaceX.
“You can’t just sit there like a rabbit in headlights saying, ‘What do I do?’ ” he said.
Karl says this week’s launch could open the door to reuses with more frequency.
“I don’t know if it’ll be historic, as SpaceX will be under pressure to do this not just more than once but many times,” he said. “But perhaps we’ll look at 2017 as the year that the door opened to reusable rockets and the commercial implications.”