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SpaceX aims to quickly return to Falcon 9 launches after its payload rocket suffered a rare malfunction during a satellite launch last week.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) received a request SpaceX To continue the launch on Monday (July 15) Falcon 9 flights during mandatory accident investigation ill-fated Starlink 9-3 mission The rocket’s upper stage leaked liquid oxygen. SpaceX has asked the FAA to issue a public safety determination, which would allow the company to resume launches if the administration determines the anomaly “does not involve safety-critical systems or otherwise endanger public safety.” SpaceflightNow reported It was reported Tuesday (July 16). The FAA also provided the statement to Space.com upon request.
“The FAA is responsible and committed to protecting the public during commercial space transportation launch and reentry operations,” the agency wrote in an emailed statement. “The FAA is reviewing the request [by SpaceX] and we will leverage data and security at every stage of the process.”
If approved, SpaceX could launch two human spaceflight missions in the coming weeks. The Falcon 9 uses different variants of the rocket for both crewed and uncrewed launches. The first astronaut launch, scheduled for July 31, will be from a privately funded Polaris Dawn The mission, which will include the first commercial flight (funded by American billionaire Jared Isaacman) space walk in high Earth orbit. The second, expected in mid-August, is the launch of Crew-9 International Space Station On behalf of NASA.
NASA said in a July 12 statement that it is monitoring SpaceX’s investigation into the Falcon 9 launch failure and its potential impact on the agency’s future astronaut missions.
“Crew safety and mission assurance are top priorities for NASA,” NASA officials wrote in the statement. “SpaceX has been forthcoming with information and is engaging NASA in the company’s ongoing anomaly investigation to understand the issue and the path forward. NASA will provide updates on agency missions, including any potential schedule impacts, as more information becomes available.”
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, which has sent 364 missions into space and has had only two failures in 14 years, suffered a second-stage liquid oxygen fuel leak during its launch on July 11.
“After a planned reburn of the upper stage engine to raise perigee (the lowest point in orbit), [single] Merlin Vacuum motor [on the second stage] SpaceX “experienced an anomaly and was unable to complete its second burn,” it wrote. July 12 update.
“Although the stage has survived and is still in use, satellites“It did not successfully circularize its orbit, but deactivated itself as is normally done at the end of each mission,” SpaceX added. “This left the satellites in an eccentric orbit with a very low perigee of 135 km [84 miles]”This is less than half the expected perigee height.”
The FAA said in a July 16 statement that a public safety determination request will be evaluated based on considerations including “safety-critical systems, the nature and consequences of the anomaly, the adequacy of the existing flight safety analysis, the performance of the safety organization and environmental factors.”
“If the FAA agrees that there are no public safety issues, the operator may return to flight while the investigation continues, provided all other licensing requirements are met,” the statement said.
The FAA did not provide a timeline for considering the request, a common practice in aviation safety investigations because of the complex nature of spaceflight. Missions with humans on board, such as Polaris Dawn and NASA’s Crew-9, would likely face an extra level of scrutiny.
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The vast majority of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rockets Starlink satellitesagain built by SpaceX to advance its broadband satellite internet business, but the rocket is also used for critical national security missions, as well as a selection of high-profile government satellite launches used for Earth observation, for example.
The Falcon 9 is also the most frequently launched of any rocket today, with 69 launches into space (including one failure) so far in 2024. China, the world’s second-largest launcher after SpaceX, 30 successful launches this year so far.