I recently watched some coverage of the launch of a SpaceX Falcon heavy rocket carrying a GOES-U weather satellite and am posting the full video here for my own reference. This means that in future hopefully I will be reminded of the time I had a question answered (as a viewer on my new Creative Bytes Youtube channel) live on-air by the NASA Space Flight channel (Note, not actual NASA themselves, but a team of very dedicated and techie space enthusiasts).

When a Falcon heavy rocket is launched, not one, but two booster rockets seperate when their fuel is used up and autonomously return to land themselves upright on the ground back at the original launch site. They can then be re-used for another flight. It’s quite amazing! Some key times in the video to save you watching the first 2 hrs of technical pre-amble:

• 2:09:46 – 45 seconds before lift-off – sadly there was some drop-out on the images during lift-off.
• 2:13:00 – Booster separations
• 2:18:00 Booster returning to earth and the base – keep watching for at least 50 seconds – or you’ll miss the touch-down of both boosters back at base!
• 2:24:20 My question (as ‘Creative Bytes’) and the answer!

Watch the 2.5 hour video from the start at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kMlfbo1lts, or fast forward to the timings I listed above to just view the highlights!

You can see more of the latest space and science related posts and information curated from across the internet by going to my Creative Bytes latest news pages.