Update May 7, 4:20 p.m. EDT: SpaceX is now targeting Thursday, May 10, for the Bangabandhu-1 mission.

Update 7:40 p.m. EDT: SpaceX conducted a static fire test of the first Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket, targeting a launch window on Monday, May 7, between 4:06 p.m. and 6:23 p.m. EDT for the Bangabandhu-1 mission to loft a Bangladeshi communications satellite.



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SpaceX is poised to launch the maiden flight of a significantly upgraded Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The aerospace company will perform a final engine fire test on Friday. The target launch window falls on Monday, May 7, from 4:06 p.m. to 6:23 p.m. EDT.



The hold-down burn of the new rocket’s nine Merlin engines will last about seven seconds and is expected to occur today before 8 p.m. EDT. The firing of SpaceX's final incarnation of the workhorse Falcon 9 will mark a return to KSC's historic Launch Complex 39A, where Apollo 11 lifted off for the moon in 1969. The last time Pad 39A saw rocket exhaust was about three months ago, when SpaceX fired off the most powerful operational rocket in the world, the Falcon Heavy.

Shortly after the static fire test, SpaceX will report if the new vehicle, dubbed Block 5, is in good health. The Block 5’s first planned mission will be launching Bangabandhu-1, a 7,700-lb. geostationary communications satellite for the nation of Bangladesh.



Mosaic of multiple photos of the first Falcon 9 Block 5 vertical on Pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center. K. SCOTT PIEL/CRAIG VANDER GALIEN

In the lead-up to the engine fire test, SpaceX lifted the doors off its massive hangar at the base of 39A on Thursday afternoon revealing the new booster, core 1046, without its payload fairing and the payload itself. There have been some dramatic changes to the look of the Falcon 9, which is now standing vertical at 39A decked out with black landing legs and a carbon fiber interstage separating the first and second stages of the rocket. SpaceX also refreshed the look and placement of its logo along the side of the Block 5 booster.

The static fire test will be conducted without the rocket’s payload fairing, which is usually mated to the top of the rocket with a customer’s satellite. SpaceX discontinued testing its Falcon 9 with a payload aboard since the Amos-6 disaster in September 2016, an explosion during fueling ahead of a static fire that destroyed the launch vehicle, launch pad, and the satellite.

In fact, one of the upgrades on the Block 5 is a more robust composite overwrapped pressure vessel (COPV) that houses pressurized liquids. SpaceX concluded one of these fuel tanks was likely the cause to the 2016 explosion due to a "void" or "buckle" in the tank's lining where oxygen accumulated and then ignited.

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Additional upgrades to the Block 5 Falcon 9 will address SpaceX’s push to fully realize a reusable rocket. SpaceX designed the Block 5 to fly again just 48 hours after a launch, and the company says the rocket can be fired ten times with minimal refurbishment. The lifespan of a single Block 5 Falcon 9 is expected to be 100 launches—quite the upgrade from just two launches per Block 4 rocket.



Falcon 9's landing legs are now retractable, allowing post-recovery ground crews on both coasts to easily reset them instead of completely removing them between launches. Block 5 also sports SpaceX's titanium grid fins, which have guided SpaceX boosters back to landings only a few times, including the twin-booster touchdown of Falcon Heavy. The bear-trap-shaped titanium fins are a permanent feature on Block 5, providing increased control and aerodynamics.

The titanium itself, which Elon Musk claimed were among the largest single castings of the material in the world, won’t catch on fire during a hot reentry—a fate its aluminum predecessor met on more than one occasion.

The interstage between the booster and the upper-stage of the rocket is also noticeably upgraded, or rather simplified. The black interstage, manufactured with carbon fiber, will not be painted on the Block 5 to save processing time between missions and reduce excess weight.

To reduce the refurbishment time even further, SpaceX is replacing the coating of white paint from previous versions of the Falcon 9 with a thermal protection coating. What may also not be noticeable to the naked eye is a new octaweb structure that houses the booster’s Merlin engines, which are now bolted on rather than welded to reduce inspection and repair time.

The payload fairing, still in the hangar, is also designed for reuse and upgraded with a larger housing area. SpaceX recently outfitted a boat named Mr. Steven on the West Coast to catch the rocket fairings after launch but has so far failed to do so. SpaceX deploys a parafoil to guide the pieces of the nose cone back to Earth—after all, the payload fairing is worth about $7 million. The company is also exploring options to recover the Falcon 9’s upper-stage, with Musk floating the idea of using balloon technology.

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SpaceX says its roadmap of refining hardware for reusability—and the reduction of overall launch costs that follow—is the key to interplanetary space travel. Elon Musk has said the Block 5 Falcon 9 will be the final launch system to debut before SpaceX consolidates the technology from its line of boosters and Dragon capsules into a massive, multi-purpose vehicle the company has began manufacturing at the Port of Los Angeles: the BFR.

Since the first SpaceX booster successfully touched down at Cape Canaveral in December 2015, the company has repeated the feat 23 more times, with 13 of those landings on one of the company’s drone ships.

SpaceX will attempt to recover its first Block 5 booster on the ship Of Course I Still Love You in the Atlantic after the launch of Bangabandhu-1. When evaluated, the performance of Block 5 will determine the success of the Falcon 9 redesign, and the flight will provide some sense of whether SpaceX is ready to build a Big Fucking Rocket to take us to Mars.