Another busy week of spaceflight activities contained a landing failure of a Falcon 9 booster for the first time in over three years. Looking forward, Falcon 9 could launch up to three times this week, including three Starlink flights. Polaris Dawn’s launch date has been delayed due to an unacceptable weather forecast at the time the Dragon capsule would splashdown off the coast of Florida at the end of the mission.
Other launches included Blue Origin’s eighth crewed New Shepard mission, Galactic Energy flying a Gushenxing-1S from the sea on its fourth mission this year, and a CASC launch of Chang Zheng 4B for the third time in 2024.
Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 8-6
Completing its launch out of SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station(CCSFS), Falcon 9 headed off to an inclined orbit of 53 degrees taking a batch of Starlink v2 Mini satellites on a northeastern trajectory. Liftoff occurred on time on Wednesday, Aug. 28, at 3:48 AM EDT (07:48 UTC)
Falcon 9 B1062 completes 23 missions but unfortunately topples over on ASOG. Before this, SpaceX had 267 successful Falcon booster landings in a row.
Please note that they always expected to lose some boosters on landing; it was just crazy that they had such a run of successes. https://t.co/q6pRXA3ktf pic.twitter.com/yQySUlamWU
— Chris Bergin – NSF (@NASASpaceflight) August 28, 2024
Booster B1062 flew for the 23rd time after launching missions like Inspiration4, Ax-1, and many Starlink missions. Having delivered the second stage into space, B1062 returned to land on one of SpaceX’s autonomous drone ships, A Shortfall Of Gravitas. Immediately upon landing, there was a sizeable fire beneath the booster’s engines and the booster toppled over, resulting in its destruction. B1062 is the first booster to fail on landing since Feb. 16, 2021, a stretch of 267 consecutive successes.
The second stage went on to successfully deploy the payload as expected. SpaceX immediately stood down the launch of Starlink 9-5 after the loss of B1062. The failure of the booster caused the FAA to get involved to complete a mishap investigation. This landing failure grounded all of the upcoming Falcon 9 launches for two days but the vehicle was cleared to fly again on Friday, Aug. 30.
We asked the @FAANews if SpaceX may return to flight for tonights Starlink missions.
The FAA responded to @NASASpaceflight : pic.twitter.com/GCNRroEATN
— Adrian Beil (@BCCarCounters) August 30, 2024
Gushenxing-1S | How Far I’ll Go
A Gushenxing-1S (also known as Ceres 1S) rocket launched from the sea at 5:20 UTC on Aug. 29 from the Haiyang Spaceport in China’s eastern province of Shandong. The vehicle lifted off from the converted launch barge Dong Fang Hang Tian Gang. Gushenxing-1S brought 6 Earth observation satellites to a sun-synchronous orbit. This was Gushenxing-1S’s 4th mission of 2024 and 15th mission of all time.
Blue Origin brought six more people into suborbital space with New Shepard on Aug. 29 at 8:07 AM CDT (13:07 UTC). Taking off from Launch Site One in West Texas, booster NS4 conducted its 11th flight. After separation from the crew capsule, the booster landed at the North Landing Pad followed by the crew capsule touching down in the desert.
Key stats from today’s mission:
The Crew Capsule reached an apogee of 342,314 ft AGL / 345,961 ft MSL (104 km AGL / 105 km MSL)
The booster reached an apogee of 341,985 ft AGL / 345,632 ft MSL (104 km AGL / 105 km MSL)
Official launch time was 8:07:03 AM CDT / 13:07:03 UTC.…
— Blue Origin (@blueorigin) August 29, 2024
Six crew members flew on this launch. Nicolina Elrick, Rob Ferl, Eugene Grin, Dr. Eiman Jahangir, Karsen Kitchen, and Ephraim Rabin all got their chance to experience space. A few notable achievements happened on this flight. Karsen Kitchen became the youngest woman to cross the Kármán line, and Rob Ferl became the first NASA-funded researcher to experiment on a suborbital spacecraft.
This was Blue Origin’s eighth mission with crew on New Shepard. The previous flight, NS-25, had a dis-reefing failure where one of the parachutes did not deploy exactly as expected. Blue Origin issued a statement saying that the root cause had been identified and corrective actions had been taken to make the vehicle safer. This mission proved that the parachute issue was solved with all parachutes inflating as expected.
A view of a stack of Starlink satellites including a Starlink Direct To Cell satellite at the top. The deployable antenna and its hinge can clearly be seen in this image. (Credit: SpaceX)
Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink 8-10
Following a delay while the destruction of B1062 was investigated, the Starlink 8-10 mission launched on Saturday, Aug. 31 at 3:43 AM EDT (07:43 UTC) from SLC-40 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The rocket flew its payloads on a northeast trajectory to an orbit inclined at 53 degrees.
The booster, B1069-18, landed successfully on Just Read the Instructions, which was originally scheduled to be the drone ship for the postponed Polaris Dawn mission. The flight’s payload was 21 Starlink v2 Mini satellites, including 13 of the Direct-to-Cell variety.
Falcon 9 Block 5 | Starlink Group 9-5
Liftoff occurred on Aug. 31 at 1:48 AM PDT (08:48 UTC) within a window lasting until 2:54 AM PDT (04:54 to 09:54). B1081-9 took these satellites on their ride to space before landing on droneship Of Course I Still Love You. The successful deployment of the Starlink satellites in orbit concluded SpaceX’s 84th launch of Falcon 9 in 2024.
The Falcon 9 has launched from SLC-4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base (VSFB) to LEO. The launch profile for this mission took the satellites on a southeastern trajectory to a 53-degree inclination orbit with a deployment altitude of 284 by 294 km.
Starlink Group 9-5 has deployed 21 more Starlink v2 Mini satellites for SpaceX’s mega constellation supplying internet worldwide, 13 of those equipped with Direct-to-Cell capabilities.
Chang Zheng 4B | Unknown Payload
On Tuesday, Sept. 3 at 01:20 UTC, CASC is planning on sending another Chang Zheng 4B into orbit. With the window for launch opening at 01:13 UTC, Chang Zheng 4B will launch from LC-3 at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in China for its third mission of the year.
Little is currently known about the contents that will be delivered to space, although more will likely be shared closer to the launch date. This launch is expected to be the 159th orbital launch this year and the 51 launch of Chang Zheng 4B.
The Polaris Dawn crew wear their EVA suits during a training exercise. (Credit: SpaceX)
Falcon 9 Block 5 | Polaris Dawn
The Polaris Dawn mission will take four private astronauts to the stars for what could be one of the most groundbreaking spaceflight missions this year. Commander Jared Issacman, Pilot Scott Poteet, and Mission Specialists Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon will be spending up to five days in a Crew Dragon spacecraft as they reach higher than any human has gone in space since Apollo.
The launch date for this mission has been sliding as they await good weather forecasts for both the launch and the recovery of Dragon at the end of the mission. It is currently expected to fly no earlier than Wednesday, Sep. 4. Previously scheduled launch windows opened at 3:38 AM EDT (07:38 UTC).
I wanted to share some updates:
– The primary factor driving the launch timing for Polaris Dawn is the splashdown weather within Dragon's limits. Unlike an ISS mission, we don’t have the option to delay long on orbit, so we must ensure the forecast is as favorable as possible… pic.twitter.com/3cKEjjVqvC
— Jared Isaacman (@rookisaacman) August 29, 2024
In orbit, the Polaris Dawn crew will conduct multiple research activities including but not limited to human health during long-duration spaceflight, Starlink laser communication between spacecraft, and the performance of SpaceX’s brand new EVA suit during an EVA where Crew Dragon will have to be completely open to the vacuum of space.
READ MORE:
SpaceX was expected to launch satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office from SLC-4E at VSFB with a southeastern trajectory. Scheduled for late August, it has slipped at least a couple of days due to the launch standdown after Starlink 8-6. When it flies, this will be a dedicated Starshield launch expected to put 21 satellites into an inclined orbit of 70 degrees.
An unknown booster will be launching this mission. This booster will return and land on the droneship Of Course I Still Love You while the Starshield satellites are put into orbit by the second stage.
Not much information has been disclosed about the capabilities of Starshield satellites due to involvement in the United States government’s national defense. The satellites on this flight are believed to have imaging payloads built by Northrop Grumman.
(Lead image: Jared Isaacman pressing the ‘space’ button heading up the LC-39A elevator to Crew Dragon. Credit: Jared Isaacman / SpaceX)