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Posts with tag success

SpaceX's Falcon 1 makes orbit after four attempts

by Joshua Topolsky, posted Sep 29th 2008 at 1:11AM


It's been a long road plagued with disappointments and major mishaps, but SpaceX (and founder Elon Musk) has finally made history -- on Sunday the company's Falcon 1 rocket reached orbit. After three attempts to bring the dream to life, the space exploration company succeeded in putting the first privately-developed rocket into space. The liftoff was seen live during a webcast, and the company's site was continuously updated with news, including a message written at 16:26PDT reading:

T+0:08:21 Falcon 1 reached orbital velocity, 5200 m/s

Nominal Second stage cut off (SECO) - Falcon 1 has made history as the first privately developed liquid fueled launch vehicle to achieve earth orbit!!!!!!

Needless to say, after the trials and tribulations SpaceX has gone through (including the loss of Star Trek star James Doohan's ashes), this must be welcome relief... as well as the birth of a potentially lucrative new enterprise. Er, no pun intended.

[Via Slashdot; Thanks, Kenneth]

Video proof of the renegade satellite's destruction

by Joshua Topolsky, posted Feb 21st 2008 at 8:34AM


Sure, it's one thing to hear about that satellite getting blown to bits, but there's nothing like cold, hard video evidence to really cement our belief in the Navy's extreme skill at hitting fast moving objects in space with huge missiles. Yes -- the video is grainy and hard to make out, but if you can't tell how bad we blew that thing out of the sky... well maybe you're not looking hard enough. See it all go down (literally) after the break.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Continue reading Video proof of the renegade satellite's destruction

Alien or zombie threat averted: the spy satellite has been destroyed... probably

by Joshua Topolsky, posted Feb 20th 2008 at 11:01PM Breaking News


Just like the Navy told us, they shot that nasty satellite out of the sky with the kind of laser-like precision they've been claiming they're capable of for years. At right around 10:30 this evening, expensive missiles were fired from the deck of the USS Lake Erie, traveling into space at an excess of 5,000mph, which then slammed into the Alien / zombie-juice / Russian controlled satellite (which itself was traveling at 17,000mph). Right now details are still sketchy on just how much damage was done to the object, but word on the street (aka, from the Navy) is that just about any hit to the satellite would put it out of our misery, due to the speed and trajectory at which it's traveling. The story is still developing, so if any of the zombie spore does manage to reach Earth and spark an undead holocaust, we'll be the first to let you know.
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