Watch LIVE: Elon Musk’s SpaceX Rocket Launch (and Hopefully) Land!

Watch South African entrepreneur Elon Musk’s SpaceX attempt to send a rocket in to orbit and then land it back safely on a barge in the sea…take off is at about 8.42 pm South African time. (See UPDATE below.)

Watch the live webcast above or below.

According to SpaceX: “With this mission, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will deliver the Jason-3 satellite to low-Earth orbit…

“The Jason-3 launch is targeted for a 18:42 UTC launch from Space Launch Complex 4E at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California. If all goes as planned, the Jason-3 satellite will be deployed approximately an hour after launch.

“This mission also marks an experimental landing of the first stage on the SpaceX drone ship ‘Just Read the Instructions’. The landing of the first stage is a secondary test objective.”

UPDATE 9.30 pm SA time: The launch was successful, as SpaceX tweeted in the last 25 minutes: “First stage on target at droneship but looks like hard landing; broke landing leg. Primary mission remains nominal”.

Update 9.42 pm SA time: SpaceX says: “Second stage re-ignition successful. Jason-3 satellite has been deployed…” Apparently it is now able to send high resolution images of the ocean and help in providing useful information about climate change.