Autonomous spaceport drone ship
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Drone ship Of Course I Still Love You carries the first rocket stage ever landed at sea (Falcon 9 FT, CRS-8 mission, 8 April 2016).
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| Location |
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| Short name | ASDS | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Operator | SpaceX | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Launch pad(s) | 2 oceangoing landing platforms | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Just Read the Instructions landing history | |
|---|---|
| Status | Active |
| Landings | 4 (1 success, 3 failures) |
| First landing | 10 January 2015 (CRS-5 mission) |
| Last landing | 14 January 2017 (Iridium NEXT mission) |
| Associated rockets |
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| Of Course I Still Love You landing history | |
|---|---|
| Status | Active |
| Landings | 6 (4 successes, 2 failures) |
| First landing | 4 March 2016 (SES-9 mission) |
| Last landing | 14 August 2016 (JCSAT-16 mission) |
| Associated rockets |
Falcon 9 Full Thrust |
| History | |
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| Name: | Just Read the Instructions |
| Owner: | McDonough Marine Service |
| Operator: | SpaceX |
| In service: | November 2014 |
| Out of service: | May 2015 |
| Status: | Retired |
| General characteristics as drone ship (2014–present) |
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| Length: | 300 ft (91 m) |
| Beam: | 170 ft (52 m) |
| Depth: | 19.8 ft (6 m) |
| Installed power: | Generator units |
| Propulsion: | 4 × 300 hp (220 kW) azimuth thrusters with 1 m (40 in) nozzles, as of January 2015[update] |
| Notes: | Autonomous or remote-controlled operation modes are available during rocket landing operations |
An autonomous spaceport drone ship (ASDS) is an ocean-going vessel derived from a deck barge, outfitted with station-keeping engines and a large landing platform. Construction of such ships was commissioned by aerospace company SpaceX to allow for recovery of rocket first-stages at sea for high-velocity missions which do not carry enough fuel to return to the launch site after lofting spacecraft onto an orbital trajectory.
SpaceX has two operational drone ships, the Just Read the Instructions in the Pacific Ocean for launches from Vandenberg and the Of Course I Still Love You in the Atlantic for launches from Cape Canaveral. As of January 2017[update], ten Falcon 9 flights have attempted to land on a drone ship, with five of them succeeding: the first successful attempt being the CRS-8 mission in April 2016.
The ASDS ships are a key component of the SpaceX reusable launch system development program which aims to significantly lower the price of space launch services through "full and rapid reusability." Any flights going to geostationary orbit or exceeding escape velocity will require landing at sea, encompassing about half of SpaceX missions.
In 2009 SpaceX CEO Elon Musk articulated ambitions for "creating a paradigm shift in the traditional approach for reusing rocket hardware."
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Wikipedia