SpaceX blasts Es’hail

For the 18th time this year, SpaceX has successfully launched to space.

After lifting off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center along the Florida coast at 3:46 p.m. on Thursday, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket delivered a communications satellite, Es’hail-2, into orbit for its latest customer, the nation of Qatar.

About 10 minutes later, the rocket booster -- which contains nine expensive, SpaceX-made Merlin engines -- descended through the atmosphere and landed in the Atlantic Ocean on the Elon Musk-named drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You."

This marks the booster's second trip to space and back again. It's also the 31st time the company has managed to land a rocket back on Earth after flying to space.

In 2017, the space company launched 18 times -- including missions for NASA and private satellites. Its customers have grown quite diverse, ranging from the U.S. Air Force to nations like Bulgaria, Korea, and Qatar.

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Most of these launches now result in successful returns of the Falcon 9 rocket boosters, an incredible feat considering that SpaceX had plenty of difficulty landing its first Falcon 9 on a drone ship.

Reusability is integral to SpaceX's business plan, which makes launching rockets significantly cheaper than rebuilding everything from scratch, and wasting engines after a single use.

Via Giphy

Speaking at a space conference about a refurbished SpaceX rocket, SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell recently said that "it was substantially less than half" the cost of building a new rocket booster.

When a customer like Qatar orders a Falcon 9 rocket launch from SpaceX, they currently pay about $62 million, according to the company's recent estimates. Space analysts have mused that using refurbished rockets could lower this launch price by some $20 million -- or more. 

SEE ALSO: Turbulent video shows the moment a Russian rocket failed, sending two astronauts back to Earth

SpaceX has five more Falcon 9 rocket launches on the docket for 2018, which would bring its total to a SpaceX-record 22 for the year, if they pull it off.

Nex year, however, looks to be an especially bold year for SpaceX. In early 2019, SpaceX plans to launch a demo of its Crew Dragon spacecraft. If successful, NASA plans to send astronauts into space aboard the Dragon capsule later in 2019.

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