SpaceX’s Falcon 9 grounded after failed attempt to land back on Earth
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said Wednesday that SpaceX’s workhorse Falcon 9 rocket had been grounded after failing to land on Earth during a routine Starlink mission. The company is now facing its second grounding 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 plunged into the ocean after a fiery touchdown, a SpaceX livestream showed.
“The incident involved the failure of the Falcon 9 booster rocket during landing on a drone ship at sea. There have been no reports of injuries or damage to public property. The FAA is requesting an investigation,” an FAA spokesperson said.
Groundings of Falcon 9, the rocket much of the Western world relies on to launch satellites and people into space, are rare. The rocket was last grounded in July for the first time since 2016, after a second-stage failure in orbit took down a batch of Starlink satellites.
While no satellites or people were in danger during Wednesday’s flight, the failed landing indicated something was wrong with the rocket, which the FAA believes could pose a greater risk to future missions if a thorough investigation is not conducted.
The rocket grounding could delay the launch of SpaceX’s high-profile Polaris Dawn mission, carrying four private astronauts set to perform the first private spacewalk. The Polaris mission was scheduled to launch this week but was delayed by a launch pad problem and then again by bad weather.
After the grounded flight in July, SpaceX resumed flying the Falcon 9 15 days later after the FAA granted the company’s request to return the plane to 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.
NASA regulates Falcon 9 for its own missions. It was not immediately clear how the rocket’s final grounding will affect that NASA mission. The U.S. space agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
SpaceX has built a sizable fleet of reusable Falcon boosters since the rocket’s first launch in 2010, allowing the company to far outpace rivals in launch frequency. The individual booster that failed Wednesday was on its 23rd flight, SpaceX wrote on X.
“After a successful ascent, the Falcon 9 first-stage booster tilted after landing on the A Shortfall of Gravitas drone ship,” SpaceX said, referring to the large ship on which the booster was to land.
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.
The FAA regulates private rockets and launch site safety to the extent that they affect the safety of the uninvolved public. The agency demanded Wednesday that SpaceX launch an investigation that would be overseen by the FAA.
“The Falcon 9 rocket may not be flown again until the FAA determines that a system, process or procedure related to the anomaly does not impact public safety,” the FAA said.
© Thomson Reuters 2024
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