Falcon 9 lights up the predawn sky

BY STEPHEN CLARK
SPACEFLIGHT NOW
Posted: August 7, 2014

A Falcon 9 launcher rocketed away from Cape Canaveral early Tuesday, boosting an AsiaSat telecommunications satellite into geostationary transfer orbit to beam television and data across China, India, Southeast Asia and the Middle East.

Nine Merlin 1D engines on the 224-foot-tall rocket ignited at 4 a.m. EDT (0800 GMT), ramping up to more than a million pounds of thrust as the Falcon 9 was released from Cape Canaveral's Complex 40 launch pad.

Sending a wave of sound across the Florida spaceport, the slender booster ascended through clouds and pitched east over the Atlantic Ocean, speeding into space with the AsiaSat 8 communications satellite.

The first stage's nine engines cut off about three minutes after liftoff, leaving the Falcon 9's second stage to complete two burns to place AsiaSat 8 in an elliptical orbit with a high point of about 22,300 miles tilted 24.3 degrees to the equator.

See our Mission Status Center for the latest news on the mission.

Photo credit: AsiaSat/SpaceX

Photo credit: SpaceX/Spaceflight Now

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