Science

SpaceX's Launching a Falcon 9 Today, But Where the Hell’s the Falcon Heavy?

SpaceX via Flickr

SpaceX will attempt to launch a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral on Monday, in what could be a threepeat for this month. Overall, it’s a pretty routine mission for the company, which is all to say, what the hell is going on with the Falcon Heavy? You know, the heavy-lift rocket that’s supposed to launch in November that Elon Musk has been unusually tight-lipped about.

Before we even get to the Falcon Heavy drama, let’s talk about today: This afternoon, the aerospace company will be ferrying up its first-ever South Korean communications satellite— called Koreasat-5A — into a Geostationary Transfer Orbit (GTO). This mission is basically an update for Korean communications network KT SAT, as this new satellite will replace an older one currently in space.

The Falcon 9 rocket will depart from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, and is slated to do so no earlier than 3:34 p.m. Eastern, when the launch window opens. After dropping off its satellite, SpaceX will attempt to land the Falcon 9’s first stage on the Of Course I Still Love You droneship in the Atlantic Ocean. At least that’s the plan for now.

You can watch the whole shebang live thanks to SpaceX:

While it’s certainly exciting that today’s mission marks SpaceX’s 16th launch this year, we can’t help but wonder, what’s up with the Falcon Heavy? Musk first announced his plans for the reusable heavy lift rocket back in 2011 and said he expected a test launch in 2013. Clearly, that timeline didn’t pan out, although SpaceX tweeted back in September that the Falcon Heavy’s “3 first stage cores [had] all completed testing.” Amid all this confusion, it appears Musk still plans to launch this thing in November, although the exact date seems TBD.

It’s great to see SpaceX making so much progress with its Falcon 9 launches. Still, it would be nice to have some update on the Falcon Heavy unless, of course, Musk has gotten distracted with his newly announced Big Fucking Rocket (BFR). In any case, I’ll continue to desperately tweet at Elon about the Falcon Heavy in hopes he’ll finally respond out of pity.

In any case, I’ll continue to desperately tweet at Elon about the Falcon Heavy in hopes he’ll finally respond out of pity.

If you liked this article, check out this video on the nerdy way Elon Musk comes up with the names for his inventions.

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