What a comeback! SpaceX launches first rocket after September explosion

Image courtesy: YouTube/Space Videos

Washington: 4 months after an unmanned rocket exploded last September in Florida, SpaceX has successfully launched its Falcon 9 rocket from the launch pad at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base in the US.

This is the aerospace company's first launch after the explosion last September, which destroyed a $200 million Facebook satellite.

The launch was earlier scheduled for January 8, however, had to be delayed due to the intense wind and rain.

Lift-off finally came Saturday at 5:54 p.m. (local time) as planned.

The rocket, which forms part of a space project by the private company headed by the billionaire co-founder and CEO of Tesla Motors, Elon Musk, is on a mission to carry 10 commercial satellites into space for Iridium Communications, which plans to install up to 70 of them by early 2018.

Moments after the Falcon 9 soared into the sky, the rocket's two sections separated as planned, sending the satellites to orbit and the tall portion, known as the first stage, of the rocket back to Earth.

Cheers erupted at SpaceX mission control in Hawthorne, California as live video images showed the first stage powering its engines and landing steady and upright on a platform marked with an X in the Pacific Ocean.

SpaceX has successfully landed multiple rockets this way, on both land and water, as part of its effort bring down the cost of space flight by re-using multimillion dollar components instead of jettisoning them in the ocean after launch.

It was the first in a series of launches planned to upgrade Iridium's global communications network.

The USD 3 billion project aims to send 81 satellites to low-Earth orbit in coming months.

Watch the video of the launch below:

(Video courtesy: Space Videos)

(With Agency inputs)