SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket Incident Investigation

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket recently experienced an inflight failure during the “Starlink Group 9-3” mission, which was launched from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base. The rocket’s upper second stage failed to reignite its engine as planned, causing it to be destroyed. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk confirmed the incident and mentioned that the engine failure was due to a leak of liquid oxygen in the second stage.

Following the incident, Falcon 9 is currently grounded until the Federal Aviation Administration approves SpaceX’s investigation report. The FAA stated that they will be involved in every step of the investigation process and will need to sign off on any corrective actions. This grounding is expected to delay upcoming launches, including two crewed missions: The private Polaris Dawn and NASA’s Crew-9.

Although the rocket’s upper stage failed, SpaceX managed to deploy 20 Starlink satellites into a lower than intended orbit. The company made contact with 10 of the satellites in an attempt to use their onboard thrusters to climb higher in orbit. However, due to the “enormously high-drag environment” caused by the lower orbit, the satellites will not be recovered and are expected to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere and burn up.

Falcon 9 has a remarkable track record of success, with more than 300 consecutive successful orbital launches before this recent incident. The rocket has launched a total of 354 missions to orbit, with over 300 successful landings and the reuse of rocket boosters more than 280 times. Prior to this incident, the last inflight failure for Falcon 9 occurred in June 2015 during the NASA cargo mission CRS-7.

The recent inflight failure of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket during the “Starlink Group 9-3” mission has led to the grounding of the vehicle pending an investigation by the Federal Aviation Administration. Despite the setback, Falcon 9 has had an impressive history of success and remains a key player in the space industry. SpaceX’s ability to recover from this incident and continue their ambitious launch schedule will be closely monitored by industry experts and space enthusiasts alike.