The last time the rocket engine was deafened by the launch complex 39A of the Kennedy Space Center was owned by NASA’s Atlantis space shuttle, which completed a 30-year mission.
On Sunday, the SpaceX rocket Falcon 9 progled the engine as tested in the trenches of the 39A launch complex in Florida. The rocket must launch on Saturday to deliver the Dragon cargo ship to the ISS.
“The first check on the historic complex is complete,” SpaceX wrote on Twitter on the day of the event.
In 2014, the company signed a 20-year lease for one of the old reusable launch sites for its Falcon 9 and its planned Falcon Heavy.
The company's founder and chief executive Ilon Mask on Twitter noted that 39A had previously used Apollo's mission to the moon. “The same complex was used for the Saturn-5 rocket, which for the first time allowed people to look at the moon in 1965,” wrote Musk.
NASA is holding a second pad 39B for a heavyweight launch system.
New SpaceX site is located north of the place that was the main launch at Cape Canaveral Station in Florida. But the launch complex 40 was badly damaged on September 1 after the accident with the Falcon 9 rocket engine.
Site repair is underway. Company President Gwyn Schutwell said that costs should be less than half the price of a new launch pad. And this is about $ 100 million.
