NEXT SPACEFLIGHT

Status

Success

Psyche

Launch Time
Fri Oct 13, 2023 14:19 UTC

Rocket

Falcon Heavy
Image Credit: SpaceX
SpaceX
Status: Active
Price: $97.0 million
Liftoff Thrust: 22,819 kN
Payload to LEO: 63,800 kg
Payload to GTO: 26,700 kg
Stages: 2
Strap-ons: 2
Rocket Height: 70.0 m
Fairing Diameter: 5.2 m
Fairing Height: 13.0 m

Vehicles

Landing Zone 1

B1064

Flight #4
76 day turnaround
249th Falcon recovery attempt
237th successful Falcon recovery
159th consecutive successful Falcon landing and recovery
Landing Zone 2

B1065

Flight #4
76 day turnaround
250th Falcon recovery attempt
238th successful Falcon recovery
160th consecutive successful Falcon landing and recovery
Expendable

B1079

Flight #1

Mission Details

Psyche

Psyche is an orbiter mission that will explore the origin of planetary cores by studying the metallic asteroid 16 Psyche. Lindy Elkins-Tanton of Arizona State University is the Principal Investigator who proposed this mission for NASA's Discovery Program. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) will manage the project.

16 Psyche is the heaviest known M-type asteroid and is thought to be the exposed iron core of a protoplanet, the remnant of a violent collision with another object that stripped off its outer crust. Radar observations of the asteroid from Earth indicate an iron–nickel composition. On 4 January 2017, the Psyche mission was selected for NASA's Discovery #14 mission

Payloads: 1
Total Mass: 2,600.0 kg
Heliocentric Orbit

Location

LC-39A, Kennedy Space Center, Florida, USA

Stats

2023

166th orbital launch attempt

SpaceX

276th mission
72nd mission of 2023
270th successful mission
242nd consecutive successful mission

Falcon Heavy

8th mission
4th mission of 2023
8th successful mission