SpaceX's Falcon Heavy launch will make you excited about spaceflight again
Watching a rocket launch into space is like nothing else.
Your heart races. Your palms sweat, and when you hear that terminal count kick in – 10, 9, 8, 7... – it really hits home that this is a wondrous feat of engineering that you're fervently hoping will go right, but could also be moments away from turning into a ball of flame.
It feels like seconds stretch into hours as you're waiting for the rocket to lift off, and then suddenly, in the blink of an eye, the rocket is in the air, moving swiftly up into the clouds.
The roar of the engines, even from miles away is impressive.
Seconds later, the rocket is gone, out of view and on its way space. After waiting hours just to get a glimpse of a rocket breaking the bonds of Earth's gravity before your eyes, it's over in just minutes and you're left processing what you just saw.
Sound cool?
Well, get ready, because on Tuesday, that's what you should expect, even if you're watching it online.
SpaceX is set to launch the first-ever flight of its Falcon Heavy rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida. This huge new rocket is effectively three of the company's Falcon 9 rockets strapped together, and it has all the power you'd expect.
According to SpaceX, this rocket, if it successfully launches, will become the most powerful operational rocket on Earth.
It's also carrying a pretty ridiculous payload with it to space. The Falcon Heavy will launch a cherry red Tesla Roadster to a distant orbit that will bring it by Mars and then its three 9-engine boosters will come back down to Earth for a landing.
But aside from that whimsical payload and fantastic landing, the Falcon Heavy launch should get you excited about all of the opportunities spaceflight holds.
This launch is the first truly new and exciting rocket-related event to come around in a long while. It's not every day that you get to see a new rocket tested before your very eyes.
If this and a series of subsequent launches go according to SpaceX's plans, the company could truly usher in a new era of space exploration. That era – which will likely be dominated by private companies with government support – will center around pushing humanity farther into the solar system, to destinations like Mars and the moon.
And the Falcon Heavy is the start.
It represents SpaceX's ambitions for the future. Musk has long-said that he hopes SpaceX helps make humans a multi-planet species by bringing us to Mars and beyond. The Falcon Heavy is an important step toward that (pretty dang ambitious) goal.
That ambition is something all of us can afford to get at least a little excited about.
Miriam Kramer worked as a staff writer for Space.com for about 2.5 years before joining Mashable to cover all things outer space. She took a ride in weightlessness on a zero-gravity flight and watched rockets launch to space from places around the United States. Miriam received her Master's degree in science, health and environmental reporting from New York University in 2012, and she originally hails from Knoxville, Tennessee. Follow Miriam on Twitter at @mirikramer.
