SpaceX says that it has discovered the cause of the failure that doomed its Falcon 1 rocket on Saturday. The new Merlin first-stage engine that founder Elon Musk praised as the major achievement of the failed flight may have performed a little too well.
The new engine added a more thrust to the first stage than the one used on the previous flight. This caused the first stage to ram into the second stage after the two segments separated at 2 minutes and 20 seconds into the flight, Space.com reports.
“We have quite a definitive understanding of what went wrong on the last flight,” Musk told reporters in a teleconference, adding that the timing error was on the order of seconds. “If we were to increase that gap by even a second or two, this problem would not have arisen.”
Yep, that’s all it takes. A mere second to destroy a multimillion-dollar rocket and consign its payloads to a watery grave. Musk and his team are now learning the difficult lessons that every other rocket pioneer has learned before them.
Continue reading ‘Upgrade an Engine, Wreck a Rocket’
Saturday’s failure of SpaceX’s Falcon 1 launch vehicle did more than destroy three small satellites. It also sent the ashes of Mercury astronaut Leroy Gordon Cooper Jr., Star Trek actor James “Scotty” Doohan and 206 other people into the Pacific Ocean instead of orbit.
The remains were placed aboard the rocket through a Texas-based company called Celestis. A spokeswoman, Susan Schonfeld, told The New York Times that the company would re-fly the remains of all 208 people using backup samples.
This launch marked the second effort to send Doohan’s and Cooper’s ashes into space; last year, they were launched aboard an UP Aerospace suborbital rocket in New Mexico. The payload containing the ashes was lost for about three weeks in the rugged mountains before being recovered in good shape.
One of Doohan’s seven children, Ehrich Blackhound, said he has had enough. He wrote an eloquent piece on Boing Boing saying that each launch opens an unhealed wound.
Continue reading ‘Falcon 1 Crash Sent Gordo’s and Scotty’s Ashes into the Pacific’
Below is the text of Elon Musk’s statement concerning the failed Falcon 1 launch. The SpaceX founder did not speak the media after the accident; the statement was read during a brief teleconference with reporters by Diane Murphy, SpaceX’s vice president for marketing and communications.
“It was obviously a big disappointment not to reach orbit on this flight [Falcon 1, Flight 3]. On the plus side, the flight of our first stage, with the new Merlin 1C engine that will be used in Falcon 9, was picture perfect. Unfortunately, a problem occurred with stage separation, causing the stages to be held together. This is under investigation and I will send out a note as soon as we understand exactly what happened.
“The most important message I’d like to send right now is that SpaceX will not skip a beat in execution going forward. We have flight four of Falcon 1 almost ready for flight and flight five right behind that. I have also given the go ahead to begin fabrication of flight six. Falcon 9 development will also continue unabated, taking into account the lessons learned with Falcon 1. We have made great progress this past week with the successful nine engine firing.
“As a precautionary measure to guard against the possibility of flight 3 not reaching orbit, SpaceX recently accepted a significant investment. Combined with our existing cash reserves, that ensures we will have more than sufficient funding on hand to continue launching Falcon 1 and develop Falcon 9 and Dragon. There should be absolutely zero question that SpaceX will prevail in reaching orbit and demonstrating reliable space transport. For my part, I will never give up and I mean never.
“Thanks for your hard work and now on to flight four.”
–Elon–
Correction: An earlier version of this story indicated that Musk had sent the statement as an email to employees. Apparently, he did make the statement directly to employees.
UPDATE: Space.com has an email that Elon Musk sent to employees. It reads in part:
“It was obviously a big disappointment not to reach orbit on this flight. On the plus side, the flight of our first stage, with the new Merlin 1C engine that will be used in Falcon 9, was picture perfect. Unfortunately, a problem occurred with stage separation, causing the stages to be held together. This is under investigation and I will send out a note as soon as we understand exactly what happened.”
Earlier Updates:
SpaceX has suspended its webcast of the Falcon 1 launch and posted the following message on its website:
Posted August 2, 2008 - 20:38 PDT
“We have heard from launch control that there has been an anomaly. More details will be posted to the website as available.”
The last report on the vehicle came 2 minutes and 20 seconds after liftoff at 8:33 p.m. PDT:
“Vehicle switching to inertial guidance mode. 1050 m/s, altitude of 35 km.”
There is also this report from Space.com:
“A video camera mounted on the rocket appeared to show some oscillations during the ascent. Whether that was normal or a sign of trouble is not yet clear.
“About two minutes, 20 seconds into the ascent, the video broadcast provided by SpaceX was abruptly terminated. A company spokesperson then said there had been ‘an anomaly’ with the launch vehicle.”
SpaceX will try to launch its Falcon 1 rocket from the Kwajalein Atoll at approximately 5:55 pm. PDT (00:55 UTC). They’re webcasting the launch.
This is the third launch attempt for Elon Musk’s rocket. The first launch vehicle exploded shortly after takeoff. The second failed to attain orbit. This third rocket is carrying the following payloads:
- The Trailblazer satellite developed by SpaceDev of Poway, Calif., for the Jumpstart Program of DoD’s Operationally Responsive Space (ORS) Office, as a test platform to validate the hardware, software and processes of an accelerated microsatellite launch.
- Two NASA small satellites: PRESat, a micro laboratory from NASA’s Ames Research Center; and NanoSail-D, which will unfurl an ultra-thin solar sail, developed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, in collaboration with NASA Ames Research Center.
Falcon 1 lifts off on its second test flight. Credit: SpaceX
Third Time’s the Charm?
Geoffrey Little
Air & Space Magazine
“For [Elon] Musk, it’s a critical moment in his second career. A co-founder of PayPal with a personal fortune estimated at more than $300 million, the South African native has sunk more than a third of that amount into his 470-person space company. This is not a hobby; SpaceX’s manifest lists 14 launches through 2011, all with customers who have contracted for low-cost launches on Falcon 1 and the much larger Falcon 9, which is being built and tested for launch early next year.
“Musk aims to use these rockets and their variants to smash the current price to reach orbit. A Falcon-1 launch costs under $8 million, about half the industry average; the Falcon 9 goes for less than $37 million to lift 7,700 pounds to low Earth orbit; a planned Falcon-9 Heavy will be able to lift 62,000 pounds for $94.5 million.”
Rob Coppinger of Flightglobal and Hyperbola has a couple of SpaceX updates. CEO Elon Musk recently visited London, where he spoke before the United Kingdom’s Royal Aeronautical Society.
Musk says that his company, SpaceX, should complete development work on its first Dragon test vehicle by the end of the year. Dragon, which is designed to carry cargo and crew to the International Space Station, will be flight tested next year. The work is being done under NASA’s COTS program.
Coppinger also reports that Musk has set a price tag on the cost of sending a Dragon spacecraft on a circumlunar flight: $80 million.
This strikes me as a fairly low figure. It’s a bold claim coming from a company that has yet to fly anything successfully in space. SpaceX’s small Falcon 1 rocket has failed in two launches; a third attempt is set for later this summer. The larger Falcon 9 booster, which would be required for a lunar mission, has not yet flown. There also would be significant modifications required for the Dragon spacecraft, which is designed for orbital use.
Coppinger recorded Musk’s 10-minute address to the Royal Aeronautical Society and the hour-long Q&A that followed. You can access audio recordings here.
SpaceX has delayed the scheduled third test flight of its Falcon 1 launch until at least the end of July amid conflicting reports amid conflicting reports from founder Elon Musk as to why…..
SpaceX pushes back target date for next Falcon 1 launch
Spaceflight Now
23 June 2008
“Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Space Exploration Technologies Corp., said the U.S. Army range at Kwajalein Atoll will be busy with other activities for the next month.
“‘Launch is no sooner than late July to early August,’ Musk said. ‘We will use the time to do additional checkouts.’
Minute Defect Delays SpaceX’s Falcon 1 Launch Again
Space.com
30 June 2008
A tiny weld defect discovered in one of the Falcon 1’s engine nozzles as the rocket was being readied for a late June launch contributed to Space Exploration Technologies’ (SpaceX) decision to postpone its third attempt to put the rocket into orbit by at least a month…
“One Kwajalein official told Space News the range would be open and available throughout July with no launch activity on the schedule ‘unless there’s a black program going on that I don’t know about.’
“[Army Missile Command spokesman John] Cummings confirmed that the range would remain open throughout July, but said he did not know whether it is available to SpaceX sooner than July 29. ‘We haven’t looked because they did not ask for it,’ he said.”
SPACEX PRESS RELEASE
McGregor TX – Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) conducted the first five-engine firing of its Falcon 9 medium to heavy lift rocket at its Texas Test Facility outside McGregor on Thursday, May 29. At full power the engines generated almost half a million pounds of force, and consumed 1,750 lbs of fuel and liquid oxygen per second. This five engine test again sets the record as the most powerful test yet on the towering 235-foot tall test stand.
The test of the five Merlin 1C engines, arranged in a cross pattern like the Saturn V moon rocket, is the last step before firing the full complement of nine engines, scheduled for this summer. With all engines operating, the Falcon 9 generates over one million pounds of thrust in vacuum - four times the maximum thrust of a 747 aircraft.
“This is the first time that we’ve added more than one engine at a time, and all phases of integration and testing went smoothly,” said Tom Mueller, Vice President of Propulsion for SpaceX. “As with previous tests, we saw no unexpected interactions between the engines, and are on schedule for adding four more engines.”
The first Falcon 9 will arrive at the SpaceX launch site at Cape Canaveral by the end of 2008. The next flight of SpaceX’s smaller Falcon 1 rocket is scheduled for late June or July of 2008.
Gregg Easterbrook takes issue with NASA’s “Who, us?” attitude toward protecting the Earth against errant asteroids in a piece titled, “The Sky is Falling,” in The Atlantic. “The odds that a potentially devastating space rock will hit Earth this century may be as high as one in 10. So why isn’t NASA trying harder to prevent catastrophe?” Easterbook’s answer? NASA is obsessed with putting humans on the moon.
A Russian Progress vehicle was launched from Kazakhstan on Wednesday with fresh supplies for astronauts aboard the International Space Station. And what will the fastest men alive be receiving in additional to their regular shipment of clothes, oxygen and fuel? Snails. Ninety of them. (No, they’re not going to eat them; it’s all part of a biology experiment. Really.)
In other news, SpaceX’s Elon Musk is saying that he could launch astronauts to ISS aboard his Dragon spacecraft by 2011 if NASA gives the OK to develop a human-rated version of the vehicle this summer. This date is at least two years (or four or five) before NASA would be able to launch its Orion vehicle.
This is an ambitious goal given that SpaceX has yet to successfully launch anything into space. It failed in both attempts to launch its small Falcon I rocket; a third attempt is scheduled for next month. Dragon will be launched atop the company’s larger Falcon 9 rocket, which has yet to fly.
