Tweet
Someone call Guinness;
Iridium NEXT's entire constellation of 72 satellites goes up 9 at a time on 8 Falcon 9's. A $3 BILLION contract for SpaceX. Guess the 8 sats under the last Dragon was practice, not to mention having a s***load of R&D money for crew Dragon and Falcon Heavy.
Universe Today....
Iridium NEXT's entire constellation of 72 satellites goes up 9 at a time on 8 Falcon 9's. A $3 BILLION contract for SpaceX. Guess the 8 sats under the last Dragon was practice, not to mention having a s***load of R&D money for crew Dragon and Falcon Heavy.
Universe Today....
>
This time, only a single launch provider, SpaceX, and their twice-flown Falcon 9 rocket have been given the nod to accomplish the job. They will also complete the planned 72 satellite fleet in only eight launches of nine satellites each. Sixty-six of these satellites will be fully operational; the remaining six will be on-orbit spares (in case there is a contingency with any of the operating satellites). Iridium will also have nine additional ground spares.
But Iridium has plans to further maximize the value of these satellites by selling space on them so that other firms can attach sensors or experiments.
“Every one of these satellites has a budget of about 110 pounds that can be used to fly extra payloads from different customers,†said Iridium’s CEO Matt Desch during a recent interview. “We will be hosting other people’s sensors on our satellites.â€
The arrangement between Iridium and the NewSpace firm was just one in a string of successes as far as SpaceX is concerned. With the first two successful flights of the Falcon 9 rocket, the unspoken-but-obvious backing of the White House and the contract with Iridium, SpaceX is on a winning streak that shows little signs of abating. With the second launch of its Falcon 9 rocket, SpaceX became the first company to do what only nations had done before – send a spacecraft into orbit and have it return safely to Earth (the Dragon spacecraft splashed down in the Pacific Ocean a few hours after launch).
>
This time, only a single launch provider, SpaceX, and their twice-flown Falcon 9 rocket have been given the nod to accomplish the job. They will also complete the planned 72 satellite fleet in only eight launches of nine satellites each. Sixty-six of these satellites will be fully operational; the remaining six will be on-orbit spares (in case there is a contingency with any of the operating satellites). Iridium will also have nine additional ground spares.
But Iridium has plans to further maximize the value of these satellites by selling space on them so that other firms can attach sensors or experiments.
“Every one of these satellites has a budget of about 110 pounds that can be used to fly extra payloads from different customers,†said Iridium’s CEO Matt Desch during a recent interview. “We will be hosting other people’s sensors on our satellites.â€
The arrangement between Iridium and the NewSpace firm was just one in a string of successes as far as SpaceX is concerned. With the first two successful flights of the Falcon 9 rocket, the unspoken-but-obvious backing of the White House and the contract with Iridium, SpaceX is on a winning streak that shows little signs of abating. With the second launch of its Falcon 9 rocket, SpaceX became the first company to do what only nations had done before – send a spacecraft into orbit and have it return safely to Earth (the Dragon spacecraft splashed down in the Pacific Ocean a few hours after launch).
>