Created 19-Jan-23
Modified 13-Dec-23
from floridatoday.com...
Twenty-seven SpaceX Merlin engines tore through sunset sky above Kennedy Space Center on Sunday, propelling a triple-core Falcon Heavy rocket with some five million pounds of thrust to deliver a Space Force mission to orbit.
Illuminated by the day’s last light, the 230-foot rocket vaulted off pad 39A on time at 5:56 p.m. EST, then separated its two side boosters two and-a-half minutes later. Nearly the entirety of separation and three burns leading to landing at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Landing Zones 1 and 2 were visible to the naked eye.
Helping the visibility were ideal weather conditions, which the Space Force said were nearly 100% “go” just before launch.
Eight minutes after liftoff, both side boosters touched down seconds apart as the rocket’s center core continued on to deliver a batch of Space Force payloads, some of which were classified, to orbit. The USSF-67 mission marked the Department of Defense’s third flight on Falcon Heavy since the rocket’s debut nearly five years ago.
As usual, the side boosters generated sonic booms during their descent. Depending on location, they could be heard - and felt - between eight and nine minutes after liftoff.
Both boosters flew USSF-44, also a Falcon Heavy mission, that launched in November of last year.
The Space Force released details on two of the payloads before launch: Space System Command’s Continuous Broadcasting Augmenting SATCOM, or CBAS-2, which will provide “communications relay capabilities in support of our senior leaders and combatant commanders” from geosynchronous orbit 22,236 miles above Earth.
The second confirmed spacecraft, capable of carrying multiple known and secretive payloads, was labeled Long Duration Propulsive ESPA, or LDPE-3A.
© Dennis Huff
