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The Space Exploration Technologies Corporation ('''SpaceX''') is a Space-transportation Startup Company whose stated goal is to improve the cost and reliability of access to Space "ultimately by a factor of ten". It is based in El Segundo , California . SpaceX is developing a family of mostly reusable Two-stage Kerosene – Liquid-oxygen Launch Vehicle s. The Falcon 1 is designed with a reusable lower stage, while the larger Falcon 5 and Falcon 9 will be the world's first fully reusable launchers and have multiple first-stage Engines . BACKGROUND SpaceX was founded in June 2002 by CEO / CTO Elon Musk , who had also co-founded Startup Companies Zip2 and PayPal , and who so far has invested in SpaceX about $100,000,000 of the fortune he gained through the sales of his two previous companies. Although Musk has stated that he could financially handle a couple of early-launch failures, he also has said "If we have three consecutive failures {Link without Title} it's not clear to me that we know what we're doing and maybe we should go out of business." As of November 2005 , the company has approximately 160 employees.1 The launch crew in the Marshall Islands comprises 25 persons, with 6 in mission control. This small number of employees, when compared to other companies that produce similarly sized rockets, is part of the cost reduction that Musk is trying to achieve. He sees other rocket manufacturers as providing space-launch services at an unreasonably high price to support an unnecessary bureaucracy. LAUNCHER VERSIONS LAUNCHES Falcon 1 was developed and launched first. Maiden flight prototype.]] at Space Launch Complex—Three West (SLC-3W), Vandenberg Air Force Base.]] The maiden launch of the Falcon 1s occurred on , 25 March), from Omelek Island , in the Kwajalein Atoll . After 29 seconds of flight, the main engine failed, leading to loss of the vehicle soon thereafter. An investigation of the cause of the propulsion failure is underway. High-resolution photography of the launch shows the engine on fire during ascent. At the National Space Symposium, on 5 April 2006 , Elon Musk reported that a pad processing error was seemingly responsible for allowing the fuel leak to take place. The fuel leak was small in volume, started 4 minutes prior to engine ignition, but could have been prevented if loosening of a small fuel pipe fitting required by work on an avionics box the previous night had been correctly retightened. The leak could also have been spotted during the countdown if the proper measurements had been monitored, according to SpaceX's founder.2 The company provided a live Webcast of the flight from various launchpad cameras, with mission-control voiceover. The webcast showed water-dump, ignition, and pad liftoff. The view switched to an onboard camera, with the atoll clearly receding in the background. About 40 seconds into the flight, the webcast ceased. The 19.5- Kilogram (43- Pound ) United States DARPA payload FalconSAT-2 was built by United States Air Force Academy cadets to investigate the phenomenon known as "space weather", or Plasma in the Upper Atmosphere . The planned orbit was 450 Kilometer s (280 Mile s). The Falcon 1 maiden flight was originally scheduled for 1:00 P.M. PST (4:00 P.M. EST, 9:00 P.M. GMT) on March 24 . An unplanned hold of about 90 minutes occurred because a ship tasked with recovery of the first stage was in a restricted down-range zone. On March 17 and March 22 , before the maiden flight, two static firings were performed in order to validate the rocket hardware and launch procedures. On November 26 , 2005 , a launch attempt was postponed ("scrubbed") because of weather and ground-related holds. On December 19 , 2005 , a second scrub occurred when a faulty valve caused the first-stage kerosene tank to deform during an unfueling maneuver. Subsequently, the launch tower was redesigned to reduce liquid-oxygen boil-off and to avoid wind-related holds. On February 10 , 2006 , further static testing led to a delay for an unspecified cause. ''See also'' Ariane 5 Flight 501 for comparison. Upcoming launches The second Falcon 1 launch will loft a astronaut Gordon Cooper and '' Star Trek '' actor James Doohan . The maiden launch of the Falcon 9 is scheduled for late 2007 , with a U.S. government payload, followed by a launch, in the first quarter of 2008 , with a payload of a Bigelow Aerospace Genesis Pathfinder expandable space-station module {Link without Title} . |
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