SpaceX sent just one leading European capsule to the final frontier.
A Falcon 9 rocket picked up a rideshare mission from Cape Canvart Space Force Station in Florida today (April 21) at 8:48 pm (0048 GMT on 22 April), which calls the Spacex Bandwagan -3.
The Falcon 9 riding payload is Phoenix 1, a retirement capsule manufactured by the German company Atmos Space Cargo. If all go to plan, Phoenix 1 will soon return to Earth, after a single circuit of our planet in Atlantic will be about 1,200 miles (2,000 kilometers) from the coast of Brazil after a single circuit. It is the first Reventry Mission organized by an European company according to ATMOS.
The goal is to test the inflatable heat shield and other core techniques of the system, showing crafts can safely bring valuable cargo from space to Earth – some ATMOS plans for different types of customers in the near future.
The company’s website reads, “Our mission is to bring a revolution in space logistics, which enables groundbraching progress in microgravity research, in-arbitra manufacturing, defense application and life sciences.”
Bandwagan -3 is a rideshair mission, so Phoenix 1 was not alone at Falcon 9. Also today there were 425SAT-3, which will be operated by the agency for South Korea’s defense development, and Kal-S7, Vedar-Forecasting outfits a satellite for the company Inc. tomorrow.
The Bandwagan series, with the first two missions launched in April 2024 and December 2024, is not the only rideshare line in SpaceX.
Elon Musk’s company also operates a program called Transporter, which has 13 missions under its belt to date. The first transporter flight sent 143 satellites into class in January 2021, a single-launch record that still stands.
