Demo (Test Flight)

Crew

Starman

Space Traveller

Status: Active
2/6/2018 -
Nationality: Earthling
Type: Non-Human
Agency: SpaceX

"Starman" is a mannequin dressed in a spacesuit occupying the driver's seat of Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster, launched to an heliocentric orbit on Falcon Heavy's inaugural launch.

Mission

Demo Flight 1 (Maiden Flight)

Type: Test Flight

This will be the inaugural flight of the Falcon Heavy. The test payload will be SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's midnight cherry Tesla Roadster playing Space Oddity. Destination: An elliptical, heliocentric orbit. Apoapsis: Around Mars' orbital distance.

Location

Launch Complex 39A

Kennedy Space Center, FL, USA

182 launches have been at this location.

Rocket

Falcon Heavy

Length: 70 meters
Diameter: 12.2 meters
First Launched: February 6, 2018

The Falcon Heavy is a variant of the Falcon 9 full thrust launch vehicle and will consist of a standard Falcon 9 rocket core, with two additional boosters derived from the Falcon 9 first stage.

The Falcon Heavy rocket has been launched a total of 3 times with 3 successful and 0 failed launches.

Landing

The first stage of the Falcon 9 failed to land on the ASDS, OCISLY, stationed of the east coast. According to CEO Elon Musk the center core did not have enough ignition fluid to restart the two outer engines during its final approach to the ship. As a result, the center core was destroyed when it impacted the water at over 480kmh merely 100 meters from the droneship.

Of Course I Still Love You – OCISLY

The second ASDS barge, Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) services launches in the Atlantic Ocean and was the site of the first landing of a SpaceX Falcon 9 first stage during CRS-8, the launch of a Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station.

Autonomous Spaceport Drone Ship – ASDS

An autonomous spaceport drone ship (ASDS) is an ocean-going vessel derived from a deck barge, outfitted with station-keeping engines and a large landing platform. Construction of such ships was commissioned by aerospace company SpaceX to allow for recovery of rocket first-stages at sea for high-velocity missions which do not carry enough fuel to return to the launch site after lofting spacecraft onto an orbital trajectory.

Agency

SpaceX

Type: Commercial
Abbreviation: SpX
Administration: CEO: Elon Musk
Founded: 2002
Launchers: Falcon
Spacecraft: Dragon
Country: USA

Space Exploration Technologies Corp., known as SpaceX, is an American aerospace manufacturer and space transport services company headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by entrepreneur Elon Musk with the goal of reducing space transportation costs and enabling the colonization of Mars. SpaceX has many pads, on the East Coast of the US they own SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral and LC-39A at the Kennedy Space Center for their lower inclination launches. They also own SLC-4E at Vandenberg, California for their high inclination launches. Another site is also being developed at Boca Chica, Texas.