SpaceX Falcon 9 May Resume Flights as FAA Investigation Underway
The SpaceX Falcon 9 vehicle may be put back into service while the overall investigation into an anomaly during a recent Starlink mission continues, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said Friday.
SpaceX filed the request Thursday to return the workhorse vehicle to flight, and the FAA gave its approval Friday. The agency said flights can resume “provided all other licensing requirements are met.”
On Wednesday, the FAA grounded the Falcon 9 after an attempt to land back on Earth during a routine Starlink landing failed
mission, which forced the company to ground for the second time this year.
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 successfully launched a series of Starlink internet satellites into orbit early Wednesday morning from Florida. The rocket’s reusable first stage returned to Earth and attempted to land on a sea-going boat as usual, but crashed into the ocean after a fiery touchdown.
It’s a rare grounding for Falcon 9, a rocket much of the Western world relies on to launch satellites and people into space. The rocket was grounded for the first time since 2016 in July, after a second stage failure in orbit took down a fleet of Starlink satellites.
After the grounded flight in July, SpaceX resumed the Falcon 9 15 days later after the FAA granted the company’s request to resume the flight sooner.
Falcon 9 will also launch two NASA astronauts in late September in a Crew Dragon spacecraft. That spacecraft will return next year the two astronauts who were stranded on the International Space Station after flying in Boeing’s disabled Starliner spacecraft.
SpaceX has built a significant fleet of reusable Falcon boosters since the rocket’s first launch in 2010, allowing the company to far outpace its competitors in launch frequency.
Shortly after Wednesday’s flight, another Starlink mission was scheduled to launch from SpaceX’s other launch site in Southern California, but the company canceled that mission after a failed landing.
© Thomson Reuters 2024
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