AUSTIN, Texas -- SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk wowed a capacity SXSW crowd here today with the first public showing of a video of a rocket capable of blasting off and then returning safely and gently to the ground. And he later added he hopes to one day travel (perhaps one-way) to Mars.
The video of the company's Grasshopper rocket, filmed just about a day-and-a-half ago, demonstrates one of SpaceX's key propositions: That it can develop reusable rockets at a fraction of the cost of a traditional NASA mission, and that it can bring them back down with the ease of a helicopter.
According to a statement put out by SpaceX, the Grasshopper -- a vertical takeoff and vertical landing (VTVL) vehicle -- was able to "leap" to about 80.1 meters high, hovering there for about 34 seconds and then landing safely by using its closed loop thrust vector and throttle control, touching down more accurately than ever before. The company also said that the thrust to weight ratio of the vehicle was more than one, which it said was a key landing algorithm for SpaceX's Falcon 9.
The video of the company's Grasshopper rocket, filmed just about a day-and-a-half ago, demonstrates one of SpaceX's key propositions: That it can develop reusable rockets at a fraction of the cost of a traditional NASA mission, and that it can bring them back down with the ease of a helicopter.
According to a statement put out by SpaceX, the Grasshopper -- a vertical takeoff and vertical landing (VTVL) vehicle -- was able to "leap" to about 80.1 meters high, hovering there for about 34 seconds and then landing safely by using its closed loop thrust vector and throttle control, touching down more accurately than ever before. The company also said that the thrust to weight ratio of the vehicle was more than one, which it said was a key landing algorithm for SpaceX's Falcon 9.
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