SpaceX launches barley seeds for Mars brewery
An experiment that launched into space could eventually pave the way to Budweiser becoming the first beer on Mars.
The brewery sent about 200 barley seeds to the International Space Station on Friday to see if they can survive exposure to space conditions.
The launch marked several milestones for the Elon Musk-led SpaceX, including the first time it has launched a previously used cargo pod into space aboard a rocket that had previously flown.
The firm has been seeking approval to relaunch a rocket at least 10 times and “hopefully a lot more,” said Jessica Jensen, the company’s director of Dragon mission management.
“In the future, we are going to use them a lot,” she said in a post-launch news conference at Kennedy Space Center.
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carried about 4,800 pounds of cargo aboard one of the company’s Dragon spacecraft to the space station. Experiments included an investigation into the benefits of manufacturing fiber-optic filaments in microgravity, along with the delivery of a sensor that will measure space debris that floats around the station for the next two or three years.
“The research destined for the ISS National Lab on this mission gives a great snapshot on the wide-ranging capabilities of the orbiting laboratory,” said Patrick O’Neill, spokesman for the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space.
The Budweiser experiment will become one of 329 ongoing experiments underway on the space station.
In mid-November, Budweiser officials confirmed that the company planned to start testing the intergalactic brewery process.
Budweiser Vice President Ricardo Marques said that the business was “inspired by the collective American dream to get to Mars.”
The seedlings will be in orbit for about 30 days, when they will return to earth for a team from the brewery to analyze — a sampling will be evaluated to see whether they have any mutations, adaptations or other responses to the conditions.
The company first announced its intention to brew beer on Mars at the South by Southwest gathering in Austin, Texas, this year.
The seeds flew aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule that had previously carried cargo to the ISS in April 2015. The Falcon 9 rocket used previously flew in June and was marked with soot from its previous flight.
Friday’s launch, which was the final SpaceX launch of 2017 from Florida, had been pushed back several times in the past two weeks. Most recently, a Wednesday launch date was scrapped because inspectors detected particles in the secondstage fuel system.
“A million things have to go right but any one of them can go wrong,” Jensen said. “It’s hard to quantify what would happen but everything dealing with a launch (must be right) because once it takes off, you don’t have command of the vehicle.”
SpaceX expects to launch its experimental Falcon Heavy rocket booster from the coast in January.
When it does, the company will try to land three boosters: two on landbased landing zones and one on a drone ship, Jensen said Friday.
The launch was the 15th flight of a Dragon capsule, the 14th mission to the ISS and the 13th with actual cargo. SpaceX, along with Orbital ATK, took over resupply missions to the ISS for NASA after the end of the space shuttle program.
It also was the company’s return to Launch Complex 40, which had been shut down since a rocket exploded on the launch pad in September 2016.
Richard Tribou contributed to this report