B1051 dutifully launched Canada's Radarsats and is now safely back on landing zone LZ-4 at Vandenberg. Unfortunately Vandenberg's familiar fog did obscure the countdown prior to the launch and the first few seconds after ignition, but 1051 quickly lifted above the clouds into the blue sky. The fog once again obscured the last moments of its landing, but touchdown could still be seen through the on-board camera.
The second stage engine has shut down and its orbit has been judged good. As I write this the three Radarsats are still attached to the second stage, awaiting deployment in about half an hour. The SpaceX feed should show that.
Edit: All three Radarsats are deployed.
Here's a room full of Canadians at Natural Resources Canada (in Ottawa?) cheering as the rocket lights up in the fog (it's just a bright diffused light) and then rising from out of the fog bank.
https://twitter.com/Christyne_T/status/1...7685521409
The Canadian Space Agency apparently had a live-feed going too (that I didn't know about) with their own commentary. The video below doesn't seem to include the launch, but covers the deployment. (Filling in a lot of the time between launch and deployment when SpaceX was off the air, just playing music.) They give us more information about how the satellites will position themselves, deploy their antennae and solar arrays and phone home. They say that this set-up phase will take something like five days.
After a woman provides this sort of information, a man alternates with her making weird gibberish sounds for a while. (Don't try to figure it out, it's a Canadian thing.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_conti...HymuF3y6uc
The second stage engine has shut down and its orbit has been judged good. As I write this the three Radarsats are still attached to the second stage, awaiting deployment in about half an hour. The SpaceX feed should show that.
Edit: All three Radarsats are deployed.
Here's a room full of Canadians at Natural Resources Canada (in Ottawa?) cheering as the rocket lights up in the fog (it's just a bright diffused light) and then rising from out of the fog bank.
https://twitter.com/Christyne_T/status/1...7685521409
The Canadian Space Agency apparently had a live-feed going too (that I didn't know about) with their own commentary. The video below doesn't seem to include the launch, but covers the deployment. (Filling in a lot of the time between launch and deployment when SpaceX was off the air, just playing music.) They give us more information about how the satellites will position themselves, deploy their antennae and solar arrays and phone home. They say that this set-up phase will take something like five days.
After a woman provides this sort of information, a man alternates with her making weird gibberish sounds for a while. (Don't try to figure it out, it's a Canadian thing.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_conti...HymuF3y6uc