United States-based firm SpaceX on Saturday launched a supply mission to the International Space Station, using its first recycled cargo ship in a bid to bring down flight costs, reported AP. The mission, which was supposed to take off on Thursday, had to be delayed to Saturday because of thunderstorms.

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket blasted off at 5.07 pm on Saturday carrying the Dragon capsule. After it delivered the capsule to orbit, it decoupled from the spacecraft and returned to Cape Canaveral for a successful touchdown, SpaceX Mission Control said.

“Dragon confirmed in good orbit,” SpaceX tweeted 11 minutes after the launch at National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. The capsule, which was last sent carrying supplies to the ISS in September 2014, has almost the same parts from its earlier flight.

The Dragon, carrying 6,000 pounds of supplies, will attempt to reach the ISS around 36 hours from the launch, reported TechCrunch. “It is starting to feel kinda normal to reuse rockets,” SpaceX Chief Elon Musk tweeted. “That’s how it is for cars and airplanes and how it should be for rockets,” he said.

“SpaceX did a very thorough job in terms of certification of the Dragon and referring it,” Space Station Program Manager, Kirk Shireman, at the Johnson Space Center in Houston told CBS News. “The risk was not substantially more than a brand new dragon capsule.” </s> SpaceX on Wednesday blasted off its unmanned Dragon cargo ship, loaded with supplies, science experiments and food for the astronauts living at the International Space Station but failed to successfully land its booster afterwards.

"We have had a great liftoff," said SpaceX commentator John Insprucker, as the Falcon 9 rocket soared into the sunny, blue sky over Cape Canaveral, Florida at 1:16 pm (1816 GMT), carrying 5,600 pounds (2,500 kilograms) of gear.

The mission, SpaceX's 16th for NASA as part of a long-term contract to ferry supplies to space, successfully made it to orbit, which was the primary goal of the launch.

But the tall portion of the rocket missed its goal of securing an upright landing on solid ground at Cape Canaveral's Landing Zone 1.

After separating from the second stage, and firing its engines to return to Earth, a video camera on board showed the first stage spinning.

Then the live feed was cut off.

"Grid fin hydraulic pump stalled, so Falcon landed just out to sea," CEO Elon Musk said on Twitter.

"Appears to be undamaged and is transmitting data. Recovery ship dispatched."

SpaceX has landed more than 30 of its boosters successfully back on Earth, either on land or on a floating platform.

The effort is aimed at reducing the cost of launches by re-using expensive components, instead of jettisoning them in the ocean after each mission.

The rocket was initially meant to take off Tuesday, but was delayed for a day after engineers discovered moldy mouse food in one of the science investigations designed to study the effect of microgravity on the immune system.

The bad food was replaced ahead of Wednesday's launch.

Other experiments among the more than 250 on board include a new kind of mustard green lettuce that astronauts will grow in space.

The Dragon space capsule that flew on Wednesday was used once before, on a supply mission in February 2017.

It should arrive at the space station on Saturday. </s> (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP). In this photo provided by NASA, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, with the Dragon spacecraft onboard, is seen at Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Saturday, June 3, 2017. SpaceX is trying a...

(Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP). In this photo provided by NASA, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, with the Dragon spacecraft onboard, is seen at Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Saturday, June 3, 2017. SpaceX is trying a...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - The Latest on SpaceX trying to launch first recycled supply ship to the International Space Station (all times local).:

SpaceX has launched its first recycled cargo ship to the International Space Station.

An unmanned Falcon rocket lifted off Saturday from Florida's Kennedy Space Center with a Dragon capsule that made a station delivery nearly three years ago.

Eight minutes later, the first-stage booster used to launch it was back home in Cape Canaveral following another successful landing. SpaceX Mission Control declared, "The Falcon has landed." Soon afterward, the refurbished Dragon was safe in orbit.

The booster used Saturday is new, but as is now the custom, returned for a vertical touchdown. It's all part of SpaceX's long-term effort to save money through reusability.

As for the Dragon, when it reaches the orbiting lab Monday, it will be the first returning craft since the now-retired shuttles.

SpaceX has launched its first recycled cargo ship to the International Space Station.

An unmanned Falcon rocket lifted off Saturday from Florida's Kennedy Space Center with a Dragon capsule that made a station delivery nearly three years ago. When this refurbished Dragon reaches the orbiting lab Monday, it will be the first returning craft since the now-retired shuttles.

The same capsule is back for take two after a few modifications and much testing.

The first-stage booster used Saturday is new, but as is now the custom, will attempt to return to Cape Canaveral following liftoff. It's all part of SpaceX's long-term effort to save money through reusability.

Besides the usual supplies, the 6,000-pound shipment includes mice and flies for research.

The flight was delayed two days by thunderstorms.

SpaceX is trying again to launch its first recycled supply ship to the International Space Station.

Forecasters at Florida's Kennedy Space Center are cautiously optimistic storms won't halt Saturday afternoon's countdown like they did Thursday.

Atop the Falcon rocket is a Dragon capsule loaded with 6,000 pounds of station cargo. The same Dragon made a delivery to the orbiting outpost for NASA in 2014 and then was refurbished for an unprecedented second flight. SpaceX will attempt to recover this new rocket booster for recycling, too. The first-stage booster will aim for a landing at Cape Canaveral following liftoff.

SpaceX hopes to slash launch costs by reusing its rockets and capsules. For now, savings are minimal because of all the inspections and tests performed on the already flown parts.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. </s> For the first time in the history of commercial spaceflight, a used spacecraft has blasted off on a mission to deliver cargo to the International Space Station (ISS).

After lightning strikes delayed the launch on Thursday (June 1), lingering storm clouds parted just enough for SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket to safely lift off from NASA's historic Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida today (June 3).

The Falcon 9 rocket, topped with SpaceX's first refurbished Dragon cargo craft, took to the skies at 5:07 p.m. EDT (2107 GMT). About 8 minutes after liftoff, the first-stage rocket booster returned to Earth to stick a landing at nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. [Launch Photos: SpaceX's 1st Reused Dragon Spacecraft]

A little over 10 minutes into the flight, the Dragon separated from the Falcon 9's second stage, deployed its solar arrays and began its three-day trek to the ISS. On Monday (June 5), the spacecraft will dock at the space station's Harmony module, delivering close to 6,000 lbs. (2,700 kilograms) of supplies and science experiments to the Expedition 52 crew.

Today's launch marked the 100th mission to lift off from Launch Complex 39A, where NASA's Apollo missions and dozens of space shuttle missions were also launched. "For [SpaceX], it's the seventh launch this year, and you can tell that we picked up the rate significantly," Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of flight reusability at SpaceX, said in a prelaunch briefing on Wednesday (May 31).

"We are hoping to stay at this rate through the rest of the year and work our backlog down. We're hoping to also fly more and more refurbished Dragons, and the same is true for the first stages," he said. "The next launch after this is also refurbished first stage."

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying a used Dragon cargo craft blasts off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on June 3, 2017. (Image credit: SpaceX)

Another historic 1st for SpaceX

Today's mission is the latest in a series of historic firsts for SpaceX, the private spaceflight company founded by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk. In March, the company successfully launched and landed a used rocket booster for the first time. SpaceX is also the first and only company to have landed a rocket booster during an orbital mission (though Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin has achieved this multiple times on suborbital journeys). And in 2012, SpaceX's Dragon capsule became the first private spacecraft to dock at the ISS.

With the ultimate (and highly ambitious) goal of being able to reuse all major components of their launch vehicles, SpaceX is now putting the Dragon to the test. The capsule first flew on a cargo mission to the space station on Sept. 21, 2014, for the cargo resupply mission CRS-4, and it returned to Earth with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean one month later.

"Once this capsule landed, we refurbished it, inspected it, made sure everything is qualified for the next flight," Koenigsmann said.

But the capsule isn't 100 percent reused parts, Koenigsmann added. Certain parts had to be replaced for a number of reasons, such as exposure to seawater during splashdown, he said, and the heat shield needed to be replaced for safety. "But I can tell you the majority of this Dragon has been in space before and has been docked to the station for a couple of weeks."

The next steps toward full reusability for SpaceX involve figuring out how to refurbish the second-stage rocket booster and the payload fairings — an ambitious but important goal, Koenigsmann said.

"This whole notion of reuse is something that's very important to the entire space industry and NASA as well as Space X and others," Kirk Shireman, manager of NASA's ISS program, said in the briefing. "The idea of reuse is important for economic reasons as well as technical reasons." [SpaceX Gaining Substantial Cost Savings From Reused Falcon 9]

Science on board

Along with food, water, clothing and other gear for the astronauts at the space station, the Dragon will deliver plenty of science experiments.

The experiments on board will support about 220 investigations currently happening at the space station. "They span a multitude of scientific disciplines, including biological research, the physical sciences, the human research that we're doing with the astronauts, the technology demonstration studying Earth and space from the ISS, and then last but not least, the educational activities that students have an opportunity to participate in," Camille Alleyne, an associate space station program scientist at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, said at the briefing.

One astrophysics experiment, called the Neutron star Interior Composition ExploreR (NICER), will investigate the possibility of utilizing neutron stars — the ultradense cores of dead stars — to develop a type of interstellar GPS navigation system.

A new, experimental type of solar panel is also flying to the space station on the Dragon. Called the Roll Out Solar Array (ROSA), these new solar arrays are smaller, lighter and more efficient than the current solar panels that power the ISS.

The Dragon also contains some live passengers, including 40 mice and thousands of fruit flies. For a project called Rodent Research-5, the mice will help researchers study a new drug for osteoporosis, or bone density loss. The fruit flies will help investigators study the prolonged effects of spaceflight on the human heart.

More Earth-observation instruments are also on their way to the ISS. The Multiple-User System for Earth Sensing (MUSES) facility, developed by Teledyne Brown Engineering, contains new high-resolution digital cameras and hyperspectral imagers, bringing new capabilities to the space station's suite of Earth-observing technologies.

Email Hanneke Weitering at hweitering@space.com or follow her @hannekescience. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com. </s> SpaceX has blasted off its unmanned Dragon cargo ship, loaded with supplies, science experiments and food for the astronauts living at the International Space Station - but failed to land the rocket.

However, the launch was marred by a system failure on the rocket which caused it to land in the sea, instead of on land SpaceX at Landing Zone 1 (LZ-1) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, as planned.

SpaceX quickly cut the live feed from the rocket as it began to spin out of control.

Moments later, it said 'It appears stage 1 has made a water landing off the coast of Cape Canaveral.'

Elon Musk later confirmed the issue, saying 'Grid fin hydraulic pump stalled, so Falcon landed just out to sea.'

'Appears to be undamaged & is transmitting data.

He later added that the rocket appeared in good shape, and could be reused on a future mission.

The mission had been a complete success until the aborted landing.

'We have had a great liftoff,' said SpaceX commentator John Insprucker, as the Falcon 9 rocket soared into the sunny, blue sky over Cape Canaveral, Florida at 1:16 pm (1816 GMT), carrying 5,600 pounds (2,500 kilograms) of gear.

The mission is SpaceX's 16th for NASA, as part of a long-term contract to ferry supplies to space.

The Falcon 9 SpaceX rocket on its operational cargo delivery flight to the International Space Station lifts off from space launch complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2018. However, the launch was marred by a system failure on the rocket which caused it to land in the sea

It was initially meant to take off Tuesday, but was delayed for a day after engineers discovered moldy mouse food in one of the science investigations designed to study the effect of microgravity on the immune system.

The bad food was replaced ahead of Wednesday's launch.

Other experiments among the more than 250 on board include a new kind of mustard green lettuce that astronauts will grow in space.

The Dragon space capsule that flew on Wednesday was used once before, on a supply mission in February 2017.

It should arrive at the space station on Saturday morning. </s> SpaceX successfully launched a Dragon spacecraft filled with supplies and science experiments for the International Space Station.

The spacecraft "Space X Dragon", launched Monday from Florida to orbit, is scheduled to join the International Space Station later this week. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, NASA, said the space capsule, loaded with 2,600 kg, was launched on a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral.

During a prelaunch news conference, Pete Hasbrook, NASA’s associate programme scientist for International Space Station Programme Science Office at the agency’s Johnson Space Centre in Houston, praised the work of Commercial Resupply Services companies.

"The International Space Station is a world-class and multi- disciplinary laboratory in space," he said. "Our commercial providers help in bringing our sciences forward and keep it going on space station and bringing benefits back to Earth." </s> SpaceX launched its first recycled cargo ship to the International Space Station on Saturday, yet another milestone in its bid to drive down flight costs.

After a two-day delay caused by thunderstorms, the unmanned Falcon rocket blasted off carrying a Dragon capsule that made a station delivery nearly three years ago. When this refurbished Dragon reaches the orbiting lab on Monday, it will be the first returning craft since NASA's now-retired shuttles.

The first-stage booster flown Saturday afternoon was brand new, and as is now the custom, returned to Cape Canaveral following liftoff for a successful vertical touchdown. "The Falcon has landed," SpaceX Mission Control declared from company headquarters in Hawthorne, California, and a cheer went up.

The plan is to launch the booster again, instead of junking it in the ocean as so many other rocket makers do. Just two months ago, SpaceX launched its first recycled booster on a satellite mission. Another flight featuring a reused booster is coming up later this month.

This Dragon capsule, meanwhile, came back for take two following a few modifications and much testing. Shortly before liftoff, a SpaceX vice president, Hans Koenigsmann, called the Dragon reflight "a pretty big deal."

It's all part of the company's quest, Koenigsmann said, to lower the cost of access to space through reusability.

The Dragon soaring Saturday has the same hull and most of the same parts from its 2014 flight. SpaceX installed a new heat shield and parachutes, among a few other things, for the trip back to Earth at flight's end. The Dragon is the only supply ship capable of surviving re-entry; all the others burn up in the atmosphere. NASA's other supplier, Orbital ATK, will see its cargo carrier depart the 250-mile-high complex on Sunday, six weeks after arriving.

Besides the usual supplies, the 6,000-pound shipment includes mice and flies for research, a new kind of roll-up solar panel and a neutron star detector.

For now, SpaceX said savings are minimal because of all the inspections and tests performed on the already flown parts. NASA's space station program manager, Kirk Shireman, told reporters earlier in the week that SpaceX did a thorough job recertifying the Dragon and that the risk is not substantially more than if this were a capsule straight off the factory floor. He said the entire industry is interested in "this whole notion of reuse," first realized with the space shuttles.

It was the 100th launch from NASA's hallowed Launch Complex 39A, the departure point for the Apollo moon shots as well as dozens of shuttle missions, including the last one in 2011. SpaceX now leases the pad from NASA; the company's first launch from there was in February.

SpaceX has been hauling station supplies for NASA for five years, both up and down. This is the company's 11th mission under a NASA contract. The company's next step is to deliver astronauts using modified Dragons. That could occur as early as next year.

Until SpaceX and Boeing start transporting crews, astronauts will continue to ride Russian rockets. On Friday, a Russian and Frenchman returned from the space station in their Soyuz capsule, leaving two Americans and a Russian behind. The station was zooming over Oman in the Persian Gulf when the Falcon took flight. </s> On Monday, it launched a Falcon 9 rocket from California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base, which was headed to space—and the record books. As USA Today notes, the rocket’s booster was the first Falcon 9 to launch three missions, an important part of the company’s plan to reduce costs by reusing rockets. The booster was also the first to launch from all three of SpaceX’s pads (Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and Vandenberg). If that wasn’t impressive enough, the launch was also SpaceX’s 19th launch of the year—the previous record was 18—and it still has three more launches planned before the year is out.

To cap off this very big week, Elon Musk’s company today is planning to launch a Falcon 9 rocket loaded with thousands of pounds of cargo bound for the International Space Station (ISS). The Dragon capsule will deliver more than 5,600 pounds of food and supplies to the crew, as well as scientific experiments, including the Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation, which will measure the impact of climate change on the world’s forests. It’s SpaceX’s 16th cargo mission as part of its contract with NASA.

Here’s how to watch the launch, which is scheduled to take off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station at 1:16 p.m. ET:

Watch on NASA TV below, or at NASA’s website, or via SpaceX’s own webcast.

The launch was initially scheduled for Tuesday, but was delayed due to *checks note* moldy mouse food. According to Space.com, if all goes according to plan, the Dragon will reach the space station three days from now, and the ISS crew can start unpacking the load. The Dragon is scheduled to return to Earth in mid-January. </s> CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, the final Block 4 version of the launch vehicle to be launched, lifted of from the Cape’s Space Launch Complex 40 on a mission to resupply the International Space Station (ISS) on Friday, June 29, 2018.

The flight got underway at 5:42 a.m. EDT (09:42 GMT) with the CRS-15 Dragon spacecraft perched atop the approximately 230-foot (70-meter) tall F9. The “flight-proven” Dragon spacecraft was tasked with carrying an estimated 5,900 pounds (2,676 kilograms) worth of supplies and equipment to low-Earth orbit (LEO). From there, it is scheduled to rendezvous with the ISS on July 2.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The last Block 4 variant of the Falcon 9 rocket was launched from Canaveral's Space Launch Complex 40 in Florida on June 29, 2018. The mission, a cargo run to the International Space Station under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services contract. The CRS-15 cargo Dragon spacecraft began its ascent toward the International Space Station at 5:42 a.m. EDT. Photos courtesy: Scott Schilke, Mike Deep, Mike Howard, Michael McCabe, Vikash Mahadeo, Andy Sokol with Turbofox Photography CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The last Block 4 variant of the Falcon 9 rocket was launched from Canaveral's Space Launch Complex 40 in Florida on June 29, 2018. The mission, a cargo run to the International Space Station under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services contract. The CRS-15 cargo Dragon spacecraft began its ascent toward the International Space Station at 5:42 a.m. EDT. Photos courtesy: Scott Schilke, Mike Deep, Mike Howard, Michael McCabe, Vikash Mahadeo, Andy Sokol with Turbofox Photography
SpaceX launches a Falcon 9 rocket with a shipment of food and supplies in a refurbished Dragon cargo capsule for the International Space Station. The mission reuses a Dragon cargo vessel that was previously flown in a September 2014 mission.