How SpaceX is going to Revolutionize Spaceflight!

I cannot wait until SpaceX makes history and successfully lands their booster rockets on a floating barge in the Atlantic Ocean!

For anyone who may be unfamiliar, here is some background information on the company SpaceX. SpaceX is a private space company started by Elon Musk. You may have heard of him because he is a billionaire who also founded the companies Tesla, SolarCity, PayPal, and SpaceX. As anyone can tell, Musk is a very ambitious man just going off the number of companies he has played a role in establishing. As I am about to discuss, SpaceX also shares Musk's ambitious attitude. 

Throughout all of spaceflight history, booster rockets have never been seen as a device to be reused. Before SpaceX, booster rockets were just components that would assist in launching a spacecraft into space and then fall back down to earth to splash into a body of water, never to be used again. Well not anymore if Elon Musk and his company SpaceX have anything to say about it! 

SpaceX has been attempting to land its booster engines onto a landing platform after it launches the spacecraft into orbit. A feat such as this would make spaceflight massively cheaper, more efficient, and quicker. The landing platform is located on an autonomous drone ship named Just Read the Instructions (shown below) that floats of the coast of Cape Canaveral whenever SpaceX is going to attempt a landing. SpaceX plans to land its boosters at a land location in the future, however, it is performing the tests at sea where there is little chance of harming people or property.  

SpaceX Autonomous Spaceport Drone Ship

So far there have been two attempts to land on this drone ship. Incredibly, both attempts were so close to making it!! I remember both landing attempts were subject to postponements either due to poor weather conditions, the air force tacking system experiencing issues, and the Atlantic Ocean being too rough to attempt the landing. Each delay made left me in greater anticipation for the rescheduled rocket launch date and time.

The first attempt to land on the platform was decently close. Sadly, SpaceX failed to land the rocket successfully. After reviewing the flight records and data surrounding the landing, it was determined that the grid fins ran out of hydraulic fluids. The grid fins are a crucial part of the landing procedure because they guide and control the rocket booster's descent down to the platform. 

SpaceX Grid Fins (or Lattice Fins)

As seen in the GIF below, the rocket did approach the barge, however, the loss of steering control resulted in the booster's off center angle and the imminent crash and explosion.

SpaceX First Landing Attempt

The second landing attempt fared much better! In fact, the rocket did manage to land on the barge this time around but failed due to a different reason than the hydraulic fluid for the lattice fins running out. "The rocket fell on its side because the legs could not support its weight. The landing legs are designed to help keep the rocket upright, but are not strong enough to either support the rocket if it lands too fast and hard on the platform or prevent it from tipping once that process has begun." Elon Musk tweeted that the tipping was the result of a, "slower than expected throttle valve response." 

Unfortunately, it is too soon after the landing attempt for me to find a GIF to place in this blog post but I highly recommend everyone who reads this to watch this video below to see the second landing attempt. It is really, really impressive because the rocket descends vertically and lands in a vertical position before beginning to lean and eventually fall over and explode. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAzwuEmZcmE

I have no doubt that the engineers at SpaceX will solve the throttling valve response problem and reinforce the landing gear! I also look forward with (great anticipation) towards the next landing attempt! 

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/spacex-discovered-caused-falcon-9-181917817.html

http://www.businessinsider.com/why-did-the-spacex-falcon-9-crash-2015-4

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/04/fine-tuning-falcon-9-landing-throttle-valve-response/