On Tuesday, there was an incredible trip to space and back with the new SpaceX rocket as SpaceX shared incredible footage of Falcon 9’s flight to space and back during a recent smallsat rideshare mission which is a big milestone in the space race.
On Tuesday, January 3, Falcon 9 launched SpaceX’s sixth dedicated smallsat rideshare mission, Transporter-6, which also marked the firm’s first launch of 2023.
SpaceX launched the Falcon 9 rocket from the Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station with 114 payloads on January 3.
The rocket launch video, which SpaceX shared on Twitter on January 5, 2023, follows the Transporter-6 mission from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
This was the 15th successful mission for this particular Falcon 9 rocket and the 200th orbital flight that SpaceX has completed since its founding way back in 2002.
As the rocket reaches its intended altitude, the first stage gets separated from the second stage. After stage separation, the Falcon 9’s first-stage booster made it’s way back to Earth, landing safely on Landing Zone 1 (LZ-1) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, marking the successful completion of the launch.
It’s also a great way to see how SpaceX engineers have created their reusable rocket, giving us a clear view of the various boosters that help move the rocket into place as it comes down to the surface of our planet. Perhaps one day, we’ll even get a view like this of the rocket that SpaceX plans to use on the first commercial mission to Mars.
Transporter-6 had a wide range of payloads that included CubeSats, microsats, picosats, and orbital transfer vehicles carrying spacecraft to be deployed at a later time. The primary payload was the satellite named EOS SAT-1, which has been developed by EOS Data Analytics (EOSDA). It is the first orbital class rocket capable of reflight, which means it can be reused multiple times.
