Falcon 9 engines successfully fired

SpaceFlight Now reports that the test firing of the nine Merlin 1C first stage engines on the new Falcon 9 launcher was successful.

The test took place on Friday March 13 at 1730 GMT in Cape Canaveral's Complex 40 and the engines generated more than 800,000 pounds of thrust.

Falcon 9 is designed to lift payloads into either Low or High Earth Orbit (HEO) and the first launch carrying the Dragon Qualification Unit is currently slated for April. Dragon is a space capsule designed by SpaceX to provide supplies and later also crewed flights to the International Space Station (ISS).

The earlier testing of the engines had been unsuccessful because a valve hadn't been opened, a report can be seen at http://www.spacex.com/updates.php

Read the SpaceFlight Now story at
http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon9/001/100313staticfire/

Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX)
http://www.spacex.com/

Wiki - Elon Musk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk

Mars Oasis Project
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=3698

Gunter's Space Page 2010 Launches
http://space.skyrocket.de/doc_chr/lau2010.htm