The private space company SpaceX this Monday missed the landing on a barge at sea of the first stage of its reusable rocket Falcon 9, which would have been the 50th successful landing. The mission, however, made it possible to put 60 new satellites into orbit without difficulty, forming the Starlink constellation, a large-scale project by Elon Musk's company intended to provide Internet from space.
Smoke can be seen in the far right of the screen. 1056.4 did not land on OCISLY. #SpaceX #Starlink pic.twitter.com/bDQ4VVlqbA
- Nathan Barker (@NASA_Nerd) February 17, 2020Contrary to what has been practiced for decades, SpaceX has revolutionized the space industry by building rockets which make it possible to recover the first stage for reuse, a technique which drastically reduces costs. But this Monday, the first stage of the craft did not appear on the images broadcast live by a camera on board the barge, located in the Atlantic Ocean, at the time of the supposed landing. The takeoff took place in Cape Canaveral, Florida at around 10 a.m. local time.
300 satellites already in orbit
"Unfortunately, we didn't land the first floor on our barge, but it landed gently in the sea next door, so it looks like it's in one piece," said Jessica Anderson, engineer at SpaceX. The reasons for this failure were not immediately known. The rocket in question was used for the fourth time.
In total, around 300 satellites are already in orbit, but a few are already broken down. The grid of the sky will have to be dense enough so that several satellites are always in direct line with the subscriber of the future Internet service. Other companies, such as OneWeb, also aim to provide broadband Internet from space. Elon Musk hopes to eventually gain 3 to 5% of the world Internet market, a share estimated at 30 billion dollars per year.
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