SpaceX has been cleared by the FAA to resume flight operations for its Falcon 9 rocket, even though the company’s investigation hasn’t yet been fully closed. SpaceX released a statement detailing what caused the failure of its second stage earlier this month and a short term fix ahead of Saturday’s early morning Starlink launch.
In a statement by the FAA, the agency cleared SpaceX to continue launching just a few weeks after the failure occurred. In what has to be some sort of record, the company’s Falcon 9 rocket will soon return to flight this weekend with as many as three Starlink launches in rapid succession.
On July 11, SpaceX suffered a failure of its Falcon 9 second stage during a circularization burn on the Starlink Group 9-3 mission. SpaceX contributed the failure to a liquid oxygen leak that formed inside the insulated section of the Merlin Vacuum engine shortly after the start of the first burn.
In a post on Thursday, the company shared details into what caused the leak during flight. According to SpaceX and noted in their review submitted to the FAA, the leak was caused by a “crack in a sense line for a pressure sensor attached to the vehicle’s oxygen system.”
The cracked was caused due to higher than normal vibrations from the engines because a loose clamp holding down the line. The remedy to get the Falcon 9 flying again is to remove the sense line for upcoming flights. SpaceX says the sensor isn’t used for any safety systems and can be covered by nearby sensors.
Returning to flight
It’s important to note that SpaceX didn’t say the line wouldn’t be staying out forever. Teams must still be working on a solution to ensure this loose clamp doesn’t return on future missions. However, the FAA has cleared SpaceX to launch as it doesn’t believe there is a public safety risk for returning to flight.
SpaceX has three Starlink missions scheduled for this weekend that it hopes to use to kick off its return. Even though the grounding was only a couple of weeks, the delay in keeping up with missions could have cost SpaceX its chance of reaching its launch goal for 2024. But there is still a lot of time left in the year to possibly catch up.
