SpaceX gets certification to launch NASA science missions

By NewsGram Staff Writer

NASA has formally certified US-based Space Exploration Technologies Corporation's (SpaceX) Falcon 9 rocket to launch the most ambitious science missions.

The Falcon 9 is now certified by NASA as a "Category 2" launch vehicle. SpaceX has successfully launched six re-supply missions to the International Space Station (ISS) as a part of the NASA contract.

The certification process of Falcon 9 began in 2012 by NASA and SpaceX. SpaceX won an $82 million contract to launch the Jason 3 mission — a project jointly funded by the US and France to measure sea roughness.

The scheduled mission by NASA named Jason 3 is ready to lift-off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California in July. The two-stage Falcon 9 rocket will deploy the 1,124 pound spacecraft into orbit 830 miles above the Earth.

The core objective of the mission is to deploy a satellite in earth's orbit. The satellite will then activate a radar altimeter to bounce signals off the world's oceans to measure wave height, sea level rise and other data that are important for weather forecasting, oceanography and climate change research.

NASA spokesperson George Diller in a statement said, "The certification now clears the Falcon 9 to launch what NASA calls 'medium-risk' science missions, a classification that includes most of the agency's Earth observation satellites and many of its interplanetary probes."