The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requires an investigation into the in-flight failure of SpaceX‘s Falcon 9 rocket as it launched a group of Starlink internet satellites.
The second-stage engine failure occurred Thursday evening during a routine launch of the satellites from Vandenberg Space Force Base in Santa Barbara County, California.
About an hour after liftoff, the rocket’s second stage, carrying 20 Starlink internet satellites, failed to re-ignite and instead deployed the satellites into a dangerously low orbit where they risk crashing into Earth burning up its atmosphere, Reuters reported.
In a statement on X, SpaceX posted: “During tonight’s Falcon 9 launch from Starlink, the second stage engine did not complete its second burn. As a result, the Starlink satellites were deployed in a lower orbit than intended.
“SpaceX has so far made contact with 5 of the satellites and is attempting to raise them into orbit with their ion thrusters,” the company added. The SpaceX founder, Elon Muskwho also owns X, formerly Twitter, followed up with a highly technical explanation about ion thrusters, a form of electrical propulsion used in spacecraft.
“We’re updating satellite software to run the ion thrusters at their equivalent of warp 9. Unlike a Star Trek episode, it probably won’t work, but it’s worth a shot,” he said. said.
In a separate Postal on X, Musk said, “Restarting the upper stage to raise perigee resulted in an engine RUD for reasons currently unknown,” referring to a rapid unscheduled disassembly – a euphemistic industry acronym for explosion, adding: “The team is reviewing data tonight to understand the cause.”
Thursday’s failure occurred on the rocket’s 354th mission and is the first Falcon 9 failure since 2015when the rocket exploded at a launch site in Florida.
The FAA issued a statement, say: “The FAA is aware of an anomaly that occurred during the SpaceX Starlink Group 9-3 mission that launched on July 11 from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California… The incident involved the failure of the rocket’s upper stage while it was in space. No public injuries or public property damage were reported. The FAA requires an investigation.
“The FAA will be involved in every step of the investigation process and must approve SpaceX’s final report, including any corrective actions.”
