Tag: SpaceX

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SpaceX explains rocket failure (and its fix)

SpaceX Vandenberg pad
SpaceX’s return to flight is due to take place Jan. 8 at its launch facility at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. (SpaceX Photo)

SpaceX says an investigation has concluded that the Sept. 1 explosion of its Falcon 9 rocket occurred due to the failure of a helium pressure vessel, and it’s taking steps to avoid the problem for its return to flight, set for Jan. 8.

That launch will send 10 Iridium Next communication satellites into orbit from California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base. Meanwhile, repairs are continuing at SpaceX’s launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, where September’s blow-up occurred during a pre-launch fueling test.

The California-based launch company’s founder, Elon Musk, had said previously that the supercooled helium tanks played a role in the accident, which led to the fiery loss of the rocket and its commercial Amos-6 satellite payload. Today’s update adds lots more detail to that diagnosis, and explains what SpaceX is doing to address the issue.

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SpaceX delays flying astronauts until 2018

Dragon at space station
An artist’s conception shows SpaceX’s crew-capable Dragon approaching a port on the International Space Station with a cargo Dragon in the foreground. (NASA Photo)

NASA has confirmed that the commercial space taxis being developed by SpaceX and the Boeing Co. will start carrying astronauts to the International Space Station no earlier than 2018, and there’s a chance the schedule could slip even further.

Any further schedule delays could create further complications, considering that NASA hasn’t purchased seats aboard Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft for flights past 2018. In September, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said NASA wasn’t “presently looking at any additional seats beyond those that we have already purchased.”

Until SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner enter service, the Soyuz vehicles provide the only approved way to get astronauts to and from the space station. NASA’s most recent reservation with the Russians sets aside seats through the end of 2018, at a cost of $81.7 million per round trip.

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SpaceX targets January for return to flight

SpaceX Falcon 9
The next launch of a Falcon 9 rocket is expected to occur in early January. (SpaceX Photo)

SpaceX says it expects to finish its investigation of September’s fiery loss of a Falcon 9 rocket and its payload in time for a return to flight in early January.

That launch is expected to send 10 Iridium Next communication satellites into orbit from California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base.

Over the past few weeks, officials at SpaceX and Iridium had been hinting that the launch might occur in mid-December, but today’s update extends the postponement a few more weeks.

“This allows for additional time to close out vehicle preparations and complete extended testing to help ensure the highest possible level of mission assurance prior to launch,” SpaceX said.

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SpaceX applies for 4,425-satellite network

Image: SpaceX and Space Needle
During SpaceX’s Seattle announcement about an Internet satellite network in January 2015, the company’s logo lit up Fisher Pavilion at Seattle Center. (GeekWire photo)

SpaceX has laid out further details about a 4,425-satellite communications network that’s expected to provide global broadband internet access, with its Seattle-area office playing a key role in its development.

The plan is explained in an application and supporting documents filed on Tuesday with the Federal Communications Commission.

SpaceX is only one of several ventures aiming to deploy satellite-based internet services over the next few years. The others include OneWeb, a consortium with backing from Airbus, Virgin Galactic and other telecom players; and the Boeing Co., which envisions a low-Earth-orbit constellation with more than 1,000 satellites.

OneWeb is up against a 2019 regulatory deadline for beginning its service, but the time frame is squishier for SpaceX and Boeing.

In the technical information that accompanied its application, SpaceX said it would start commercial broadband service with 800 satellites.

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Elon Musk holds forth on the election and more

Image: Elon Musk
Elon Musk is the billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla. (Credit: AGU file)

Today Elon Musk laid out his views on electricity-generating solar roofs, the Tesla-SolarCity merger, SpaceX’s return to flight and artificial intelligence during an extraordinary 30-minute telephone interview on CNBC.

His timeliest comments may relate to next week’s presidential election: Musk gave a lukewarm endorsement to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

“I would say it’s not going to make much of a difference one way or the other, honestly,” he said. “I think Hillary’s economic policies and her environmental policies particularly are the right ones, you know? Yeah. Also, I don’t think this is the finest moment of our democracy in general. But so it goes.”

So what about GOP candidate Donald Trump? “I feel a bit stronger that probably he’s not the right guy,” Musk said. “He just doesn’t seem to have the sort of character that reflects well on the United States.”

Musk – who’s the billionaire CEO of the SpaceX rocket venture and the Tesla electric-car concern as well as chairman of SolarCity, a producer of solar panels – touched on a wide range of topics, with occasional commentary from one of Tesla’s biggest investors, billionaire Ron Baron.

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Elon Musk geeks out over his Mars plan on Reddit

Mars rocket
An artist’s conception shows SpaceX’s Interplanetary Transport System lifting off with a refueling tanker sitting beside it. (Credit: SpaceX)

In the weeks ahead, SpaceX plans to pressure-test a prototype carbon fiber tank on an oceangoing barge, to gauge how well the technology will stand up to the oomph that’d be required for trips to Mars.

The test is one of the near-term steps that SpaceX founder Elon Musk laid out today during an “Ask Me Anything” session on Reddit’s SpaceX discussion forum, focusing on his long-term plan to transport a million settlers to Mars.

Musk signed on to the AMA session to follow up into some of the geeky questions raised by last month’s big reveal about SpaceX’s Interplanetary Transport System. Which, by the way, Musk is not happy with as a name.

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Elon Musk makes the big pitch for Mars settlement

Elon Musk
SpaceX founder Elon Musk presents his vision for sending settlers to Mars. (Credit: SpaceX)

GUADALAJARA, Mexico – SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has made some ambitious sales pitches in his career, but today’s big reveal about his plan to transport a million settlers to Mars over the next few decades has to be the topper.

The billionaire began his 95-minute talk with the existential concern over Earth’s long-term future, and the need to set up a civilization beyond Earth to safeguard the species.

“I hope you’d agree this is the right way to go. Yes? … That’s what we want,” he told a crowd of 3,000 attendees at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara.

From there on, Musk laid out a step-by-step blueprint that culminated in a vision of a totally reusable super-spaceship that could transport 100 to 200 passengers and their luggage to the Red Planet.

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Elon Musk tweets sneak peeks at Mars plan

SpaceX Raptor engine test
SpaceX’s Raptor rocket engine undergoes its first test firing. (Credit: Elon Musk via Twitter)

GUADALAJARA, Mexico – In advance of this week’s big reveal, SpaceX’s billionaire founder, Elon Musk, is dropping hints about the scale of his plans to send colonists to Mars.

Musk is scheduled to talk about what used to be known as the Mars Colonial Transporter in Guadalajara on Sept. 27 at the International Astronautical Congress.

The “late-breaking news” begins at 11:30 a.m. PT (1:30 p.m. CT) Sept. 27. Streaming video of the talk should be available via SpaceX and YouTube as well as via the IAC and Livestream.

Musk has been building up to this presentation for months, arguably for more than a year. It’s the highlight of this year’s annual conference. Although he’s been coy about the details, Musk has let some hints slip out – for example, that the rocket should be capable of sending 100 tons of payload to Mars, or 100 passengers.

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SpaceX says tank breach may have caused blast

Image: SpaceX blast
A video stream from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida shows smoke rising from a SpaceX launch pad blast on Sept. 1. (Credit: NASA)

SpaceX says an investigation into the launch pad explosion that destroyed a Falcon 9 rocket and its satellite payload has turned up evidence of a “large breach” in the supercooled helium system for the oxygen tank on the rocket’s second stage.

Today’s update made clear that the root cause of the Sept. 1 blast at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida has not yet been identified. Nevertheless, SpaceX said it anticipated to return to flight as early as November, “pending the results of the investigation.”

SpaceX is leading the investigation, just as it did last year when a Falcon 9 broke apart shortly after liftoff. That mishap involved a component inside the second-stage oxygen tank, but today the company said it’s ruled out a connection between the two blasts.

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SpaceX’s Elon Musk: Fireball poses huge puzzle

Image: SpaceX blast
A video stream from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida shows smoke rising from a SpaceX launch pad blast. (Credit: NASA)

SpaceX’s billionaire founder, Elon Musk, says the launch-pad explosion that resulted in the loss of a Falcon 9 rocket and its satellite payload last week stands as the most puzzling failure he’s faced since he started up the company.

In a series of post-midnight tweets, Musk said it’s possible that something hit the rocket to cause the fireball.

He put out the call for any recordings of the event – and said he was particularly interested in an explosive sound that preceded the main fireball by just a few seconds. “May come from rocket or something else,” he wrote.

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