So, SpaceX launched their Falcon 1 rocket on March 20th. The Falcon 1 is a 2-stage, completely reusable rocket. On launch, the first stage worked flawlessly, getting the Falcon above the atmosphere. Unfortunately, The second stage was not able to completely get the Falcon 1′s payload into orbit.

SpaceX broadcasted the entire launch and flight via a live webcast. They had cameras mounted both at the launch platform, and on the rocket itself. When the first stage ran out of fuel, a pneumatic piston extended, kicking the second stage off the bottom of the rocket, and sending it hurtling back to Earth (a parachute allowed the first stage to fall back gracefully, and land in the ocean for recovery).

The second stage then lit up pushing the Falcon 1 even higher. Unfortunately, this is where the problems started. As the second stage started running low on fuel, the fuel began to slosh around inside the fuel tank. This caused the Falcon 1 to start rocking back and forth. This rocking got worse, and became a spin. Eventually, the motion was so bad that the fuel wasn’t going to the engine anymore … it was just bouncing around inside the fuel tank. At that point, the second stage engine died, and the Falcon 1 fell back to Earth, to be burned up in the atmosphere. It had gotten higher than the initial Space Shuttle orbit.

SpaceX considers this to be a successful launch: Other than the problem with gas bouncing around, everything else worked flawlessly. Their next launch will be their first commercial payload, in September. This will be the real test of their business model. While SpaceX has proven that they can get to space, the crux of their plan is that once the first and second stages of their rocket have fallen back to Earth, they can use them again. This isn’t a given — rockets are under enormous stress when they launch, and there is a good chance that they will be unusable after even 1 launch. However, if SpaceX is able to reuse their rockets as few as 4 or 5 times, there is a good chance that they can achieve their goal, which is to reduce launch costs by a factor of 10.

Read the official SpaceX report here.