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Falcon 9 is a reusable, two-stage rocket designed and manufactured by SpaceX. It is the world's very first orbital-class reusable rocket.

The worlds first reusable orbital-class rocket

Falcon 9 is a reusable, two-stage rocket designed and manufactured by SpaceX. It is the world’s very first orbital-class reusable rocket. This reusability allows SpaceX to offer much lower-cost options to companies wanting to gain access to space.

The Falcon 9 rocket stands at 229.6 feet tall and has a mass of 1.2 million pounds. Its first stage is powered by nine Merlin engines that generate 1.3 million pounds of thrust at sea level, rising to 1.5 million pounds of thrust once the rocket reaches the vacuum of space.

Falcon 9 can carry payloads of up to 50,300 pounds to low-Earth orbit and payloads of up to 18,300 pounds to geostationary transfer orbit (GTO). As of November 2023, SpaceX has launched 272 Falcon 9 rockets have been launched.

Falcon 9 Reusability FAQ

Why does SpaceX use parachutes?

This question is a bit more complicated, so we wrote a whole article on it.

What are the white spots and lines on reused boosters?

The spots and lines that appear lighter on the boosters after flight are where SpaceX cleans the boosters for inspections between launches. They focus on inspecting the welds, so they clean those areas to ensure the booster is safe and ready for the next flight but they don’t clean the rest of the booster.

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Why do boosters get darker every flight?

During descent, in addition to a large amount of heat generated, a Falcon 9 flies through its own exhaust during the reentry and landing burns. This deposits soot onto the sides of the booster while the legs, in their folded position, create a clean outline where the soot cannot reach.

Why doesn’t SpaceX clean the boosters?

Simply put, it is extremely costly and delays the re-flight of a booster without providing any tangible benefit. With SpaceX sometimes reusing boosters less than a month after a previous launch, those delays are costly. Likewise, using harsh chemicals or even just directly spraying boosters with water is not ideal. It doesn’t take much to cause issues. In 2020, a small piece of masking lacquer in a Merlin engine caused an engine issue that delayed multiple launches as they investigated the problem, so any risks should be avoided. Besides, just as predicted this dirtier style has truly become a space-fan favorite.

Why does SpaceX use droneships to land boosters? Why not return to land?

Landing boosters on droneships saves a great deal of fuel and increases the possible payload the booster can carry to orbit. When landing on a drone ship, the booster can continue on its trajectory and land a few hundred kilometers out into the ocean, but for a return to the launch site, the booster needs an additional boost back burn to cancel the horizontal velocity and return back to land. Depending on the payload size and flight profile of the rocket determines if SpaceX can land its boosters on land or require a droneship.

However, SpaceX is still learning in this area when it comes to launches. When SpaceX began launching its Dragon 2 capsule neither its crewed nor cargo variants could land back on land. However, after a decade plus of flight experiences and always trying to improve the rocket’s performance, SpaceX found a profile for both crewed and cargo Dragon 2 flights to return to LZ-1.

Why don’t other rocket companies reuse their boosters?

Reusing boosters is expensive and potentially risky. There is an added degree of complexity that comes with the reuse of boosters. SpaceX has an array of chartered vessels to safely return boosters, fairings, and Dragon capsules back to port which all cost money. Reusing boosters also decrease the payload to orbit of a rocket. Any fuel that needs to be used for landing is then not able to be used to accelerate the payloads.

SpaceX also follows a far different design and testing philosophy from companies like ULA. SpaceX will take many risks and fail many times over in order to develop and progress quickly; just look at Starship. ULA, on the other hand, tends to work slower and more conservatively in an attempt to ensure success and at the first launch. Reusing a rocket includes an inherent risk of failure, especially on a first attempt. According to Tory Bruno’s estimate, they would need to fly a booster 10 times in order for it to be financially justified. This is far off from the two flights that SpaceX claims they need, but even so, SpaceX has far surpassed that 10 flight number. SpaceX’s current reflight record is 18 flights.

Even with these challenges, more rocket companies are quickly moving towards reuse. ULA has the “SMART reuse” for their upcoming Vulcan rocket. Rocket Lab is a great example of a company modifying its existing rocket design for reusability, although that isn’t always possible. Rocket Lab’s next rocket, Neutron, will have reusability in mind from the start. Relativity is another company that will have reusability in mind when developing its Terran R vehicle.

How do I know when the Booster will arrive in port?

Depending on the specific trajectory of the mission, boosters launched from Florida usually arrive in Port Canaveral about 3-4 days after launch. The return can be tracked using apps like MarineTraffic if you pay for Satellite tracking, free tracking is available if they are near the shoreline. An excellent resource for the time of these arrivals is Gavin Cornwell (@SpaceXFleet on X). He tracks the movement of both SpaceX boats and other rocket-related boats and shares his time estimates for arrival.

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Where should I go to see a Falcon 9 Booster arriving?

When a Falcon 9 booster is coming into port it can be seen for miles along Cocoa Beach. To get the best, up-close view you can enter Jetty Park to see the booster arrive from on the Pier. It costs $15 a day to enter or you can purchase an annual pass. If you don’t want to pay for viewing, Freddie Patrick Boat Ramp is a public boat ramp directly next to Jetty Park. The downside of this area is that you will not be able to see the booster until it turns into the Port.

Once the booster has docked for processing, there is a small grass park that provides an excellent viewing opportunity that sits between Gators Dockside and Rusty’s Seafood. Please park in the parking across the road, the parking on the port side of the road is meant specifically for restaurant patrons.

How are these Boosters numbered?

Falcon 9 Boosters are numbered with a B followed by a four-digit number. The original V1.0 boosters started with B0000, but after the first seven they moved to B1001 and count up sequentially from there. There is a second number that follows the booster number, which is often used to designate the launch number. This is separated by either a period or a hyphen. Internally, SpaceX uses a hyphen to designate this launch number.

The final two digits of the booster number are placed on the boosters. They are visible both near the Falcon 9 logo at the top of the booster and on newer boosters, the logo is also placed between the legs of the booster. Here the “51” can be seen as B1051-10 returned to port.

As you can see these numbers are painted in black so as the booster is used more and more, it becomes difficult to tell what booster they are.

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How many times can a Falcon 9 booster launch?

Simply put, SpaceX doesn’t know. Originally thought to be 10 reuses, the amount of degradation was far less than expected and Elon has speculated that they could reach 100 launches of an individual booster. With more reuse means there will need to be more refurbishment, but SpaceX plans to continue pushing the life-leading boosters to their limits with the growing number of Starlink launches, where only their own payloads are at risk of a launch failure. Currently, booster B1058 is the life-leading booster, having flown 18 launches, starting with DM-2 in May of 2020 and most recently supporting the Starlink Group 6-26 mission.

spacex crew-6 dragon on pad

List of all SpaceX crewed flights to space

Since 2020, SpaceX has been the leader in launching crews to space for NASA. However, NASA’s bet on turning its Commercial Crew Program winners into commercial options has paid off with several missions in the books or planned that are for entirely private customers. Here’s a list of every crewed flight from SpaceX and who flew on it.

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The first all European spaceflight mission lifts off with Axiom

Thursday afternoon SpaceX launched the Axiom-3 mission out of Kennedy Space Center making it its first human spaceflight mission of the year. Another milestone first was it being the first entirely European crewed mission ever with all four astronauts holding citizenship from a European nation.

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SpaceX launches 5G direct-to-cell connection on Starlink satellites

Late last night, SpaceX launched its first rocket of 2024 out of Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. On top, in addition to the Starlink V2 mini satellites were used to, were six Starlink satellites capable of connecting directly to standard 5G cellphones. These satellites are the first following a partnership with T-Mobile announced back in 2022 to feature the connectivity, and are a major step forward for SpaceX’s satellite internet constellation.

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SpaceX rounds out 2023 with 98 total launches

Last night SpaceX rounded out the year with a double header, launching a classified mission on the Falcon Heavy for the US Air Force and Space Force and then about three hours later, 23 Starlink satellites. This completed another record breaking year with 98 total rocket launches from the company and many other milestones.

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SpaceX plans rapid increase in West Coast launch cadence

SpaceX plans to launch about 50 rockets from Vandenberg Space Force Base in 2024 with a chance of 100 launches in the year 2025. This comes to a spaceport that has historically seem launches in the single digits. Now, it could soon see a launch for SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket in the next few years.

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This Week in Launch: Ireland’s first satellite tags along with South Korean reconnaissance payload

This week we are only seeing two launches and both are from SpaceX. The obligatory SLC-40 Starlink launch and a fun little RTLS launch out of Vandenberg. By “fun little” I mean a reconnaissance satellite for the South Korean government. That mission however is also launching the first satellite for the nation of Ireland.

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SpaceX rounds out third quarter with 70 launches for the year

With today marking the first Monday of October it also marks the start of the first week of the final quarter of 2023. Seriously where has the year gone?

So now is the time to catch up with SpaceX’s 100 launch goal for the year and see if they are anywhere close from hitting it or if they even have the chance.

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This Week In Launches: Russia to launch its first crewed Soyuz of the year

With ULA sneaking in its first Atlas V launch between issues in this series, the only exciting launch I have to discuss this week is Russia’s crew rotation to the ISS. While it might seem like the only topic, it is indeed a significant event. MS-24, a crewed Soyuz mission, will replace the crew of MS-22, who have been in space for approximately a year.

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