This morning was the successful launch of of the EchoStar 23 communications satellite from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A on a Falcon 9 booster. This is the second launch of a Falcon 9 from LC-39, and the 3rd successful launch since the September 2016 explosion of a Falcon 9 rocket on LC-40.
It looks like SpaceX is back on track. For what, exactly though, is beyond me, as the company seems to be heavily over-reaching, falling in line with “trendy science” rather than finding a proper focus that is practical, but that’s not the subject here.
I don’t have much to say – these launches are mostly all the same in the long run, and as much as I enjoy watching them live they are pretty much same-old same-old. Of interest here there was no attempt to recover the booster – this type of payload orbital requirements dictates all the launch power possible, so nothing would be left to conduct a booster flyback of the first stage.
All the better, so far SpaceX still hasn’t re-flown any of their recovered stages. Enough of my snark though, as usual, here are the Hosted and Technical webcasts: (As always, I suggest you watch the Technical webcast rather than the hosted one)
Hosted Webcast:
Technical Webcast: