Space Stuff and Launch Info

[berkeman]

the upper stage which will fly to an interplanetary orbit

Sorry, what's an interplanetary orbit?

 

[Flyboy]

Sorry, what's an interplanetary orbit?

I think the plan was originally to do a Mars launch but the payload wasn’t ready in time?

 

[mfb]

I think the plan was originally to do a Mars launch but the payload wasn’t ready in time?

Vulcan was supposed to launch Dream Chaser to low Earth orbit but they payload wasn't ready in time.
New Glenn was supposed to launch EscaPADE to Mars but the rocket wasn't ready in time (and is still not ready).

ULA just launched into a trajectory that leaves Earth. No specific target.

 

[Flyboy]

Vulcan was supposed to launch Dream Chaser to low Earth orbit but they payload wasn't ready in time.
New Glenn was supposed to launch EscaPADE to Mars but the rocket wasn't ready in time (and is still not ready).

ULA just launched into a trajectory that leaves Earth. No specific target.

Ahhhh, okay, got the BE-4 powered birds mixed up.

 

[berkeman]

Vulcan was supposed to launch Dream Chaser to low Earth orbit

New Glenn was supposed to launch EscaPADE to Mars

got the BE-4 powered birds mixed up.

You guys talk funny...

 

[mfb]

Some analysis:



The rocket adjusted its flight a lot to compensate. It altered its orientation to stay on the flight path. It kept the boosters attached a bit longer so they would drop down close to their original splashdown site. The upper stage burned longer to make up for the lost thrust.

We'll have to see if that flight was good enough to certify Vulcan for national security launches. At least the Vulcan version without solid rocket motors should be fine. Maybe they can do more tests on the ground to finish certification.


No update on Falcon 9 yet, but both Hera and Europa Clipper continue their launch preparations, so SpaceX doesn't expect a longer downtime.

 

[Flyboy]

Some analysis:



The rocket adjusted its flight a lot to compensate. It altered its orientation to stay on the flight path. It kept the boosters attached a bit longer so they would drop down close to their original splashdown site. The upper stage burned longer to make up for the lost thrust.

We'll have to see if that flight was good enough to certify Vulcan for national security launches. At least the Vulcan version without solid rocket motors should be fine. Maybe they can do more tests on the ground to finish certification.

I think this was a HUGE demonstration of how capable the core and upper stages are, that they could adapt to this scenario and not lose the vehicle.

That said, some sheer dumb luck that the nozzle coming apart didn’t hit the engines or tankage on the core. Northrup Grumman Innovation Systems has a lot of investigating to do.

 

[Vanadium 50]

Sorry, what's an interplanetary orbit?

"Interplaneyary trajectory" might be less confusing, but these are solar orbits. Solar orbits designed to approach a planet, but solar orbits nevertheless. There have only been 5 probes that left solar orbit with a possibility of a sixth in space now.

 

[mfb]

It's not approaching a planet and it's not leaving the Solar System - or at least neither one is planned. A close approach with at least one planet (most likely Earth) in the next few million years is almost guaranteed for everything launched from Earth that doesn't do maneuvers later: Its orbit is still intersecting Earth's orbit.

SpaceX has finished its investigation of the misbehaving deorbit burn. The FAA still needs to approve it, but for now they have made an exception for Hera. Its launch can go ahead. There won't be a deorbit burn as the second stage will leave Earth. We can expect a similar exception for Europa Clipper if that's still needed, but NASA might want to delay the launch a bit anyway.

 

[mfb]

Europa Clipper has been delayed by at least two days because a storm is expected to go over central Florida soon. Hera launch coverage by ESA (starting in 2 hours).

 

[.Scott]

There have only been 5 probes that left solar orbit with a possibility of a sixth in space now.

By my count, only 2. Voyager 1 and 2 have done it by exceeding solar escape velocity. None have done it by colliding with the sun.

 

[mfb]

Pioneer 10 and 11 and New Horizons are the others. For Ulysses we don't know its future trajectory as it can get close to Jupiter.

The upper stage that launched New Horizons escapes, too.

 

[mfb]

Falcon 9 can return to flight. The FAA closed all open investigations.

It's going to be a busy Sunday:

* 07:05 UTC: Crew-8 undocks from the ISS for a return on Monday
* 12:00 UTC: Fifth Starship flight (with booster catch attempt)
* 13:00 UTC: New Shepard launch (new booster+capsule)

Edit: Looks like this was delayed another day by the hurricane.
* Monday 16:06 UTC: Europa Clipper on Falcon Heavy

 

[mfb]

1/3:
Crew-8 is still at the ISS because the weather in the recovery area is bad.
New Shepard was delayed, too.
Starship launched, was fully successful, and the booster catch was incredible.

Europa Clipper launch in 1 hour

We learned that the deorbit anomaly after the Crew-9 launch was the engine burning for half a second extra.

 

[bob012345]

Good launch. In this flight the boosters were discarded to get maximum performance out of the engines but this is the sixth flight of these boosters according to the video.

 

[mfb]

They flew on more than half of all Falcon Heavy missions (6/11), including Psyche a year ago.
At the moment there is just a single Falcon Heavy mission scheduled for 2025, Griffin Mission 1 in September, although military satellites might be added on short notice. There should be more flights in 2026 again.

Still waiting for good weather to land Crew-8, and waiting for Blue Origin to resolve some GPS issue on New Shepard.

In the meantime SpaceX has launched two Starlink missions. They launched 4 rockets from 4 launch pads within 48 hours and recovered 3 boosters (1*Starship, 2*Falcon 9).

 

[mfb]

6th flight of Starship on November 18. This is just 5 weeks after the previous launch.

The flight profile will be the same as for the fifth flight, but with an added ship engine relight attempt in space. The reentry will be a bit steeper to push the heat shield closer to its limits. Ideally not beyond that. And of course there will be hundreds of smaller improvements to various components and procedures.

The launch window is in the afternoon this time, so reentry over the Indian Ocean will be in daylight.

Flight 7 will be the first flight of "v2". If the relight test of flight 6 is successful, it's possible this one will enter a proper orbit and then de-orbit later. It might even deploy a Starlink satellite prototype (SpaceX is building a larger version for Starship). Don't expect that within 5 weeks, however - larger changes need more time and new FAA approvals, too.

SpaceX video of flight 5.

Edit: Delayed to November 19. Same thing a day later.

 

[mfb]

Starship flight 6 in about 5 hours.

https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=starship-flight-6

Other coverage:
NASASpaceflight:
Spaceflight Now:

 

[mfb]

A communication problem with the launch tower stopped a second catch attempt, the booster made a soft splashdown in the ocean instead.

The ship flight worked well. The Raptor re-light in space was a success, enabling future missions to stay in orbit for longer. Despite using an older heat shield, removing over 2000 tiles and weakening some areas deliberately, the ship landed safely on target in the ocean. One area of one flap got pretty hot.

SpaceX got approval for up to 25 flights per year. It's also approving the v2 and v3 versions in general. They still need to apply for a launch license for every flight, but this document says that a license can be granted and clears some of the topics common across flights.

 

[mfb]

SpaceX has launched 17 times in November and 19 times in the last 31 days. It's an outlier compared to the rest of the year, but the 2023 record was already broken earlier in October. They'll probably end up with 135-140 launches, up from 98 last year.

The first New Glenn is at the launch pad. Officially it's still aiming at a December launch.

Dragonfly will launch on Falcon Heavy. Vulcan was eligible to bid but Falcon Heavy has a better track record. Reliability is key if your payload costs over $3 billion. It will become the second vehicle to make atmospheric flights not on Earth, unless some new Mars helicopter sneaks in earlier.

 

[mfb]

Trump nominates Jared Isaacman to become NASA administrator
Isaacman funded and flew on Inspiration4 and is leading the Polaris program, where he was part of the first commercial spacewalk recently. He is a big fan of crewed spaceflight and going to Mars.

 

[mfb]

Update on the Artemis 1 heat shield issue and future timeline
The heat shield develops gas internally as it heats up. That gas couldn't escape well, cracking the material and leading to fragments breaking off. Artemis 2 will use the same heat shield (it's already installed) but an adjusted reentry trajectory to mitigate that issue.

Artemis 2 is now targeting April 2026 and Artemis 3 is planned for mid 2027.

Longer article about Isaacman and what it means for NASA

The Space Launch System might be cancelled - potentially even for Artemis 2 already. New Glenn could launch Orion and Vulcan could launch a kick stage to get Orion to the Moon. One extra launch, but it's far cheaper than SLS.

 

[Filip Larsen]

More on the NASA decision to fly with the Artemis II heat shield and an interview with the review team chair about it.

 

[mfb]

Analysis of Ingenuity's last flight
NASA thinks that the surface was too smooth for the camera to track, leading to a landing with too much horizontal velocity.

 

[russ_watters]

Additional one month delay for the definitely not stranded Starliner crew on the ISS:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/spacex-delay-means-boeing-starliner-220600274.html

 

[Flyboy]

This one’s on SpaceX. Quit beating a dead space capsule horse

 

[mfb]

Endurance landed in March, it should be ready to fly again by now. Not sure why they don't use that.

 

[russ_watters]

This one’s on SpaceX. Quit beating a dead space capsule horse

Not sure if that was tongue-in-cheek, but once when skiing in the rockies I saw a sign that warned against going off-trail, saying "Rescue, if possible, will be expensive." You go past that sign 100% at your own risk.

 

[Flyboy]

Not sure if that was tongue-in-cheek, but once when skiing in the rockies I saw a sign that warned against going off-trail, saying "Rescue, if possible, will be expensive." You go past that sign 100% at your own risk.

It was tongue in cheek. I would rather they take their time to make sure they can get the crew home safely than to rush things to keep to an arbitrary schedule. NASA has a bad track record on that, to the tune of 17 lives.

I just don’t see the point in continuing to claim that they’re “not stranded” with an emphasis on the quotes. They’re safe, they’re able to come home at need, and continuing to fixate and beat on Boeing for whatever the faults that are delaying their return further, even if implied, is not helping anyone, not even SpaceX.

 

[mfb]

The maiden flight of New Glenn is now scheduled for January 6 January 8 (6:00 UTC). The landing barge for the booster has left the port, delays are always possible but this is a serious launch date.

The seventh flight of Starship is scheduled for January 10 (22:00 UTC). First launch of a "v2" ship.