SpaceX Is Ready For Saturday’s Historic Launch; Commercial Space Domination!

If the Gods smile upon everything tomorrow as we suspect they will, the day will mark the launch of  Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 rocket. Gods further willing, the son of a bitch will dock with the ISS for the first of many, many times.

io9:

t’s official.  According to Elon Musk, CEO of private space-transport company SpaceX, NASA has given the final go-ahead on a launch that, if successful, will mark the dawn of a new era in spaceflight: the era of commercial spacecraft. Liftoff is scheduled for Saturday morning.

At 4:55 a.m. EST, SpaceX’s  Dragon capsule  and  Falcon 9 rocket  will launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, in the first of what NASA hopes will be many successful trips to and from the International Space Station. If the Dragon capsule can successfully dock with the ISS, it will represent a major milestone in NASA’s plan to place the task of crew and cargo shipments in the hands of private companies.

“It is, by all accounts, an important step, bordering on a giant leap, for commercial space,” said Michael Lopez-Alegria, a former NASA astronaut and space station commander who now heads the Commercial Spaceflight Federation.

I don’t particularly care how we as human kind explore the cosmos, so long as we continue doing it. This is radical, and I hope it promotes a whole slew of private companies getting their space flight on.