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SpaceX Resets Sets Static Fire to February |
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EL SEGUNDO, Calif, Jan. 26, 2007/Satnews Daily/ ― SpaceX Technologies has decided not to proceed with the static fire this month, which may mean further delays in Falcon 1 rocket launch attempt.
SpaceX said the static fire and launch window is now reset to mid or late February because Kwajalein will need to be reconfigured for an incoming Minuteman mission and then reconfigure back to handling a Falcon launch.
“During this downtime, we will take the opportunity to go over every inch of the rocket with a microscope again,” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said.
He added the vehicle is now back in the hangar, where the stages are being demated for careful inspection.
Late last week, SpaceX announced it was resetting its next launch attempt to February after it uncovered an anomaly on Falcon 1’s thrust vector control (TVC) pitch actuator on the second stage.
On January 17, Musk announced that the company was conducting its static fire on Friday, January 19, and said if there would be no issue, they would proceed with the second launch attempt on Monday, Jan. 22.
Musk explained that during their final check-outs prior to Friday’s static fire, they uncovered an anomaly with the TVC pitch actuator resulting in launch being pushed to February.
The keenly-awaited inaugural flight of Falcon 1 launch vehicle in March last year ended in a disaster when the rocket tumbled out of control and slammed into the Pacific Ocean shortly after its liftoff from the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Test Site on Omelek Island near Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific Ocean’s Marshall Islands.
An investigation later revealed that a fuel leak triggered a fire around the top of Falcon 1’s main engine leading to its destruction.
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