Elon Musk's aerospace company SpaceX, on Wednesday failed once again in its attempt to land a rocket on a custom-built ocean platform.
The two-stage Falcon 9 rocket was launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida to the International Space Station with a payload of near two tons of food supplies, equipment, and experiments, including an espresso machine that will work in space.
The Falcon 9 was launched at 4:10 pm Eastern time.
However, SpaceX again failed in an attempt to safely land the rocket on a floating barge on ocean. SpaceX founder Elon Musk tweeted: "Ascent successful. Dragon enroute to Space Station. Rocket landed on droneship, but too hard for survival."
Musk later tweeted, "Looks like Falcon landed fine, but excess lateral velocity caused it to tip over post landing."
The latest attempt was the third one, with the first two attempts in January and February having failed.
Most rockets are designed to burn up on reentry into earth's atmosphere, but SpaceX plans to land the rocket safely on Earth to be reused again, which has never been attempted before. Such attempt, if successful, will be a significant breakthrough in space programs and will substantially reduce the cost of such efforts.
by RTT Staff Writer
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