By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off from Florida on a cargo run for the International Space Station on Friday and its reusable main-stage booster landed itself on an ocean platform in a dramatic spaceflight first. The liftoff at 4:43 p.m. EDT (2043 GMT) from Cape Canaveral marked the resumption of resupply flights by privately owned Space Exploration Technologies for NASA following a launch accident in June 2015 that destroyed a different cargo payload for the space station. About 2-1/2 minutes after Friday's launch, the main part of the 23-story tall, two-stage SpaceX rocket separated, turned around and headed toward a landing platform floating in the Atlantic about 185 miles (300 km) northeast of Cape Canaveral.
Read more...
April 9th, 2016
--
