Mediacom world news portal
SpaceX is currently reviving the Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) launch pad at Cape Canaveral in Florida and will launch its next resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS) from this pad in December 2017, NASA has announced.
This will be SpaceX’s thirteenth mission for the American space agency under Commercial Resupply Services contract and the first from SLC-40 launch pad since September 2016, when this pad was badly damaged following a massive explosion in SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.
That nasty explosion occurred when SpaceX engineers were conducting a static fire test—a routine activity carried out before every SpaceX space mission. The explosion was huge in terms of the damage, according to the Verge. It completely destroyed the Falcon 9 rocket and also caused heavy damage to the SLC-40 pad. An expensive Amos 6 satellite built by Israel firm Spacecom was also destroyed in this explosion. Spacecom had built this satellite for Facebook to let it provide high-speed internet access in Africa, Europe and the Middle East.