SpaceX’s first attempt to launch its Starship (the company’s Super Heavy launch vehicle) ended with a spectacular explosion over the Gulf of Mexico last month. While the enormous worldwide attention that the Starship project and its recent test launch garnered might have rendered Starship synonymous with the concept of a Super Heavy in the minds of some, a small startup in the Pacific Northwest named Stoke Space is also pursuing a fully reusable launch vehicle designed for rapid turnaround, but with a different design.

SpaceNews reports the French-funded Prometheus reusable rocket program will be receiving developing funding from ESA. A small team of engineers from Airbus Safran Launchers and the French space agency CNES have poured a few million euros since 2015 into a liquid oxygen and-methane-fueled reusable engine dubbed Prometheus. ESA leaders agreed during December’s ministerial conference in Lucerne, Switzerland, to make Prometheus part of the agency’s Future Launchers Preparatory Program, or FLPP. […]

SpaceX's test site in McGregor, Texas. (Credit: SpaceX)

Via my friend Clark Lindsey over at HobbySpace comes some rather startling news:

SpaceX is developing an 106-foot tall reusable vertical takeoff and vertical landing (VTVL) rocket called Grasshopper based upon the first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket.  It has applied for an experimental permit to conduct a series of flights up to 11,500 feet at its engine testing facility in McGregor, Texas.

Here’s the description of the vehicle and its flight profile from a draft environmental impact assessment released by the FAA earlier this week:

The Grasshopper RLV consists of a Falcon 9 Stage 1 tank, a Merlin-1D engine, four steel landing legs, and a steel support structure. Carbon overwrapped pressure vessels (COPVs), which are filled with either nitrogen or helium, are attached to the support structure. The Merlin-1D engine has a maximum thrust of 122,000 pounds. The overall height of the Grasshopper RLV is 106 feet, and the tank height is 85 feet.

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