European ocean-monitoring satellite in orbit

He pointed out that the rocket was not standing upright on the platform during touchdown. If it can flawless the landing process, the rockets would be reusable and would cut costs all the way down to $200,000 for fuel, plus whatever amount it takes to ensure the vehicle is up to code. In a tweet, the company said, “First stage on target at drone ship but looks like hard landing; broke landing leg”. “Was within 1.3 meters of droneship center”.

The rocket successfully delivered the Jason-3 satellite into orbit after launching from Vandenberg Air Force Base, north west of Los Angeles. The payload was the Jason-3 satellite, a project led by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and two European partners.

The launch was successful in putting into orbit the US- and European-owned Jason-3 satellite, which aims to map what is happening to the extra heat being trapped inside the earth system by greenhouse gases.

Rockets are the portion of spacecrafts that provide the boost for liftoff, but they’re typically discarded after launch. NASA’s Space Shuttle Endeavor cost $1.7 billion to build and the average cost to launch a Space Shuttle was$450 million per mission, according to NASA.

The U.S. space agency NASA then confirmed the Jason-3 satellite “ready for science operations!” Mr. Musk, SpaceX’s founder and chief executive officer, was at Base Sunday. Landing on dry land is easier, but landing at sea is safer, SpaceX said leading up to the launch. The rocket tipped over and exploded shortly after reaching the ship.

Well, although the event is definitely a setback to the Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk backed SpaceX, it has known such events in the past too and has kept on trying.

SpaceX made history last month by landing one of its Falcon 9 rocket stages on land at Cape Canaveral, Fla. About 10 minutes after lift off the first stage of its two-stage rocket headed back toward Earth for an attempt at landing on an un-crewed, autonomous drone ship floating 186 miles south of the California launch site, in the Pacific.

It returned to space missions in December when the company successfully carried satellites into low orbit in a mission for Orbcomm.

In his latest tweet, Musk wrote that the pieces that were left from the Falcon 9 rocket are larger now compared to the ones left from previous failed launches.