SpaceX, the aerospace company helmed by Tesla  (TSLA) – Get Free Report CEO Elon Musk, has a total of 270 rocket launches under its belt, a combination of crewed missions, test launches and, mainly, Starlink satellite deployments. The space exploration firm is targeting another significant launch, in partnership with NASA, on Oct. 13. 

The launch represents NASA’s first scientific mission to be flown into space on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, NASA said in a statement. 

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The mission, spearheaded by NASA’s Psyche spacecraft, is meant to explore a metal-rich asteroid currently orbiting the sun between Jupiter and Mars. The journey to the asteroid, covering a distance of about 2.2 billion miles, is expected to take roughly six years. Once there, the Psyche spacecraft will spend a further 26 months in orbit, gathering data. 

The mission will additionally serve as NASA’s first deep space test of its Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) system, NASA said. 

Scientists, according to NASA, believe that the asteroid in question — also named Psyche — might represent a piece of the core of a “planetary building block.” Studying the metals that make it up will allow scientists to better understand the formation of planets in the solar system, as well as the composition of Earth’s own core. 

“Humans can’t bore a path to our planet’s core – or the cores of the other rocky planets – so visiting Psyche could provide a one-of-a-kind window into the violent history of collisions and accumulation of matter that created planets like our own,” NASA said. 

The Falcon Heavy rocket that will propel Psyche into the atmosphere and beyond boasts five million pounds of thrust, according to SpaceX. The company’s Falcon 9 rockets, in comparison, have around 1.7 million pounds of thrust. 

The craft, which NASA said has been tested and re-tested “many times,” is currently stacked, prepped and poised for takeoff from Kennedy Space Center. 

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Henry Stone, Psyche’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, called the pending flight a “historic voyage of scientific discovery.”  

The launch will be live-streamed on NASA TV. 

The craft was initially scheduled to launch Oct. 12 but was scrubbed due to poor weather conditions. If weather prevents its planned Oct. 13 launch, NASA and SpaceX have identified additional launch windows once every day through Oct. 25.

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