After two delays due to high winds, SpaceX launched the PACE Earth-observing satellite to orbit from Cape Canaveral this morning. Seven and one half minutes later, Booster 1081 announced its return to the Space Coast with a sonic boom moments after safely touching down, completing its fourth flight.
Falcon 9 snaps and hisses as cryogenic fluid lines are purged and changed before it launches. On some nights, like Thursday, its tanks condense water out of the air as the wind passes over it, creating a vapor cloud. It’s like a dragon stirring awake…and when it does, the fire and the heat come. It is a beast of a machine.