Falcon Heavy

Falcon Heavy (FH), previously known as the Falcon 9 Heavy, is a heavy lift space launch vehicle being designed and manufactured by SpaceX. The Falcon Heavy is a variant of the Falcon 9 full thrust launch vehicle and will consist of a standard Falcon 9 rocket core, with two additional strap-on boosters derived from the Falcon 9 first stage. This will increase the low Earth orbit (LEO) payload to about 53 tonnes, compared to about 13 tonnes for a Falcon 9 v1.1.

Following the Falcon 9 CRS-7 failure investigation in 2015, and given a very busy Falcon 9 launch manifest in 2016, the first Falcon Heavy launch is now expected in late 2016.

History

At a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, DC. on 5 April 2011, Elon Musk stated, “Falcon Heavy will carry more payload to orbit or escape velocity than any vehicle in history, apart from the Saturn V moon rocket, which was decommissioned after the Apollo program. This opens a new world of capability for both government and commercial space missions.”

Falcon

A falcon (/ˈfɔːlkən, ˈfæl-/) is any one of 37 species of raptors in the genus Falco, widely distributed on all continents of the world except Antarctica.

Adult falcons have thin, tapered wings, which enable them to fly at high speed and to change direction rapidly. Fledgling falcons, in their first year of flying, have longer flight feathers, which make their configuration more like that of a general-purpose bird such as a broadwing. This makes it easier to fly while learning the exceptional skills required to be effective hunters as adults.

The falcons are the largest genus in the Falconinae subfamily of Falconidae, which itself also includes another subfamily comprising caracaras and a few other species. All these birds kill with their beaks, using a "tooth" on the side of their beaks — unlike the hawks, eagles, and other birds of prey in Accipitridae, which use their feet.

Peregrine falcons have been recorded diving at speeds of 200 miles per hour (320 km/h), making them the fastest-moving creatures on Earth. Other falcons include the gyrfalcon, lanner falcon, and merlin. Some small falcons with long, narrow wings are called hobbies, and some which hover while hunting are called kestrels.

Heavy

Heavy may refer to:

Music

Film and television

Other

Falcon (rocket family)

The Falcon rocket family is an American family of multi-use rocket launch vehicles developed and operated by Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX). They are the first orbital launch vehicles to be entirely designed in the 21st century.

The vehicles in this family include the flight-tested Falcon 1 and Falcon 9. The Falcon 1 made its first successful flight on 28 September 2008, after several failures on the initial attempts. The larger Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV)-class Falcon 9 flew successfully into orbit on its maiden launch on 4 June 2010. The Falcon 9 is eventually intended to be a reusable vehicle. SpaceX is currently in production of the first Falcon Heavy launch system. Other designs for boosters with even larger payload lifting capabilities are currently being researched, but not yet confirmed.

Naming

Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, has stated that the Falcon rockets are named after the Millennium Falcon from the Star Wars film series.

Current launch vehicles

Tesla Roadster

The Tesla Roadster is a battery electric vehicle (BEV) sports car that was produced by the electric car firm Tesla Motors in California from 2008 to 2012. The Roadster is the first highway-capable all-electric vehicle in serial production for sale in the United States in recent times. A replacement for the Roadster is expected for 2019.

Tesla sold about 2,450 Roadsters in over 30 countries, and most of the last Roadsters were sold in Europe and Asia during the fourth quarter of 2012. Tesla produced right-hand-drive Roadsters from early 2010. The Roadster base price in 2010 was US$109,000 in the United States, £86,950 in the United Kingdom, A$191,888 in Australia, and €84,000 in continental Europe. As an electric vehicle, the Roadster qualified for several government incentives in many nations.

The Roadster was the first production automobile to use lithium-ion battery cells and the first production BEV (all-electric) to travel more than 200 miles (320 km) per charge. The world distance record of 501 km (311 mi) for a production electric car on a single charge was set by a Roadster on October 27, 2009, during the Global Green Challenge in outback Australia, in which it averaged a speed of 25 mph (40 km/h). In March 2010, a Tesla Roadster became the first electric vehicle to win the Monte Carlo Alternative Energy Rally and the first to win any Federation Internationale de l'Automobile-sanctioned championship when a Roadster driven by former Formula One driver Érik Comas beat 96 competitors for range, efficiency and performance in the three-day, nearly 1,000-kilometer (620 mi) challenge.