What caused the rare failure of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket

What caused the rare failure of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket

Subject: Science and tech

Sec: Space sector

Context:

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)  grounded SpaceX’s Falcon 9 — one of the world’s most active rockets — after the failure of its upper stage engine that stranded 20 Starlink internet satellites in a low, non-survivable orbit. The mishap occurred on the rocket’s 354th mission, and marks the first Falcon 9 failure since 2015

What is Falcon 9?

• Falcon 9 is a partially reusable rocket designed and manufactured by Elon Musk-owned SpaceX. It can transport crew and payloads to low Earth orbit (an altitude of 2000 km or less) and beyond.
• The rocket has two stages. The first stage or booster stage comprises nine Merlin engines (a family of rocket engines developed by SpaceX), and aluminium-lithium alloy tanks containing liquid oxygen and rocket-grade kerosene propellant. The second stage consists of a single Merlin engine.
• The first stage, which is reusable, is capable of re-entering the atmosphere, and landing vertically after separating from the second stage.

What went wrong with Falcon 9?

• The issue occurred roughly 30 minutes after the launch of Falcon 9 from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
• The rocket’s second stage experienced a liquid oxygen leak, and failed to complete a second, short engine burn needed to put 20 Starlink satellites in the correct orbit.
• “Although the stage survived and still deployed the satellites, it did not successfully circularise its orbit. This left the satellites in an eccentric orbit with a very low perigee of 135 kilometres (84 miles), which is less than half the expected perigee altitude.”
• The mishap occurred on the rocket’s 354th mission, and marks the first Falcon 9 failure since 2015, when the rocket exploded on a launch site in Falcon 9 is considered one of the most successful and reliable rockets ever made.

What happens next?

• The rare failure is expected to impede Falcon 9’s launch pace. In 2023 alone, the rocket made 96 launches, and exceeded the annual launch total in any country.
• The grounding of Falcon 9 is also likely to postpone upcoming missions taking astronauts to orbit. The private Polaris Dawn mission spearheaded by the entrepreneur Jared Isaacman is slated for the end of July.
• The rocket is also scheduled to take four astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) for NASA in mid-August — Falcon 9 is the only US rocket capable of taking NASA astronauts to ISS.
• The rocket will remain grounded till the time SpaceX investigates the cause of failure, fixes the issue, and gets approval from the FAA.