00:00 - You all see on the countdown that Falcon 1
00:02 is airborne at this time.
00:04 - In the early days, it was very clear.
00:05 It was like a David and Goliath story.
00:07 You know, no privately developed launch vehicle company
00:09 had ever achieved Earth orbit.
00:10 Everybody tried and failed.
00:11 - I started within the first year of the program
00:14 and we were designing and building Falcon 1.
00:18 - The rocket was out on Omelac.
00:20 It was so cool to go to this secluded place for work.
00:23 All that was there was the launch pad,
00:26 a very small hangar, an office trailer,
00:28 and basically an outhouse for a bathroom.
00:31 - We would sleep under the stars sometimes,
00:33 have horrific sunburns sometimes.
00:35 - It was like a Omelac survivor, we called it,
00:38 and we were right there next to the rocket
00:40 and the launch pad.
00:41 - Plus four, plus five.
00:43 - Living through the first few failures of Falcon 1
00:46 was really difficult.
00:48 We literally had blood, sweat, and tears on that rocket.
00:51 And then to see it come back down so quickly,
00:53 it was heartbreaking.
00:55 - Flight two was disappointing
00:56 because we made it almost all the way to orbit.
00:58 We basically started spinning out of control
01:00 once the vehicle was in space.
01:02 But then flight three was just so sad.
01:05 To basically go through stage separation
01:06 and then have the stages come back and recontact,
01:09 that one hurt the most.
01:10 - We were essentially out of money at that time.
01:12 We had had the three failures.
01:14 But luckily we had had another kind of spare vehicle
01:17 ready to go.
01:18 - We pushed super hard to get that vehicle ready.
01:21 We rented a C-17 to fly the first stage and second stage
01:26 over to Kwajalein instead of taking the three weeks
01:28 on the barge.
01:28 When we were landing, we heard a loud pop.
01:31 We looked back and saw that the first stage tanks
01:34 had sunken in.
01:35 I think we thought for sure we were done.
01:38 I think we thought that was the end of SpaceX.
01:40 - We still felt like the underdogs.
01:44 We still had everything to prove.
01:46 So it was just like, nope, we're gonna fix it
01:47 and we're gonna make this happen.
01:49 - Three weeks later, I think we had the first successful
01:52 flight of Falcon 1.
01:53 (crowd cheering)
01:56 - Ladies and gentlemen, go go go.
01:59 - It worked.
02:04 We buckled the stage on the way to Kwajalein
02:07 and we still managed to get that rocket to orbit.
02:09 So that gave us good confidence moving forward
02:11 that we'd be able to get anything to orbit.
02:14 - For me, it was like a dream come true
02:15 'cause it was something that we had been working so hard for
02:18 for years, like since I started at SpaceX
02:20 and that we had seen so many failures for.
02:22 I just felt validated and proud of the team
02:25 for doing something that I think a lot of people
02:27 didn't think was possible.
02:29 (whooshing)
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