{"id":15941,"date":"2015-11-06T22:45:43","date_gmt":"2015-11-06T14:45:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/planning-for-december-falcon-9-launch-orbcomm-ships-satellites\/"},"modified":"2015-11-06T22:45:43","modified_gmt":"2015-11-06T14:45:43","slug":"planning-for-december-falcon-9-launch-orbcomm-ships-satellites","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/planning-for-december-falcon-9-launch-orbcomm-ships-satellites\/","title":{"rendered":"Planning for December Falcon 9 launch, Orbcomm ships satellites"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Orbcomm's
Orbcomm\u2019s 11 second-generation OG2 satellites are pictured inside Sierra Nevada\u2019s factory in Louisville, Colorado. Credit: Sierra Nevada Corp.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The first shipment of Orbcomm\u2019s 11-satellite payload for the Falcon 9 rocket\u2019s first flight since a June launch failure has arrived at Cape Canaveral, and the rest of the spacecraft will reach the Florida spaceport in the coming days, Orbcomm officials said Thursday.<\/p>\n

The liftoff is expected in December aboard SpaceX\u2019s return-to-flight mission, and the maiden launch of an uprated version of the Falcon 9 booster designed to lift heavier payloads into space.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are now planning around a December launch roughly four to five weeks from today,\u201d said Marc Eisenberg, CEO of Orbcomm, in a quarterly earnings call with investment analysts Thursday. \u201cWhile there\u2019s still some work to do, mostly from the SpaceX side, December is achievable as long as their preparations continue to go well.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first six spacecraft due to fly on the launch have arrived at SpaceX\u2019s payload processing facility at Cape Canaveral, with another five due to depart their manufacturing facility near Denver in a few days, Eisenberg said.<\/p>\n

The multi-satellite adapter ring, made by Moog, that will dispense the 11 Orbcomm second-generation, or OG2, spacecraft on the launch is also being prepared for liftoff at Cape Canaveral.<\/p>\n

Components of the Falcon 9 booster itself are still awaiting shipment from SpaceX\u2019s Central Texas test facility, where they are finishing up qualification testing, to Cape Canaveral.<\/p>\n

Upgrades set to to fly first on the Orbcomm mission include \u201cfull-thrust\u201d Merlin engines rated for higher thrust levels, bigger upper stage propellant tanks, and densified kerosene fuel. The design changes raise the Falcon 9\u2019s lift capacity by about 30 percent.<\/p>\n

With the Falcon 9 grounded since its June 28 launch failure, which SpaceX blames on a structurally deficient strut inside the rocket\u2019s upper stage oxidizer tank, the Orbcomm mission will be both a return-to-flight launch and a critical debut of the company\u2019s latest rocket iteration.<\/p>\n

But Eisenberg is confident going into the launch.<\/p>\n

\"File
File photo of SpaceX\u2019s Falcon 9 rocket. Credit: NASA\/Kim Shiflett<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cSpaceX and their team have conducted a comprehensive investigation over the last few months to ensure the readiness of the Falcon 9\u2019s return-to-flight,\u201d Eisenberg said. \u201cConsidering the huge focus SpaceX has placed on this launch, and the fact that return-to-flight missions generally have more favorable success rates than those following normal missions, we have full confidence in SpaceX and believe this is our best opportunity to launch.\u201d<\/p>\n

SpaceX and Orbcomm announced in October the 11-satellite mission, which is heading for low Earth orbit approximately 400 miles in altitude, will be first in line when the Falcon 9 launch queue resumes.<\/p>\n

The decision pushed the launch of SES 9, a large telecommunications satellite heading for geostationary transfer orbit stretching more than 22,000 miles above Earth, until at least late December.<\/p>\n

The low-altitude orbit targeted on the Orbcomm flight requires a single burn of the Falcon 9\u2019s upper stage Merlin 1D engine, not two firings as needed on geostationary launches like SES 9\u2019s mission.<\/p>\n

\u201cLooking at it from Orbcomm\u2019s point of view, we have an opportunity to get launched and kick off new OG2 services that customers have been planning on for quite some time,\u201d Eisenberg said, adding that the mission enables Orbcomm\u2019s AIS vessel tracking service to go from periodic to near-realtime coverage and keeps the spacecraft out of cold storage at Sierra Nevada Corp., the OG2 satellite manufacturer.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom SpaceX\u2019s perspective, we are an ideal candidate for the first launch of the newly-updated Falcon 9,\u201d Eisenberg said. \u201cEven with 11 satellites, the mass to orbit is nearly 50 percent less than other Falcon 9 missions providing substantial performance margins.\u201d<\/p>\n

Officials said the Falcon 9\u2019s upper stage engine will conduct a re-ignition experiment after releasing the 11 Orbcomm payloads about 14 minutes after liftoff, verifying the relight system works before flying satellites that require the capability.<\/p>\n

SpaceX has successfully launched several payloads on two-burn missions using the previous Falcon 9 configuration.<\/p>\n

Orbcomm, a New Jersey-based company specializing in asset and maritime tracking via satellite, launched six identical satellites on a Falcon 9 flight in July 2014. The 11 satellites set to go in December complete the company\u2019s second-generation constellation.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom here forward, the satellites will be tested to verify proper operation after transit, fueled, then attached to the Moog dispenser, which once launched is used to dispense the satellites into orbit,\u201d Eisenberg said. \u201cThe final satellite operation is to encapsulate the satellite stack into the Falcon 9 fairing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eisenberg said he expects to announce a specific launch date \u201cin a couple of weeks,\u201d but a December launch would be late at night.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we launch in December as expected, break out the coffee,\u201d Eisenberg said. \u201cLooks like a late evening event, great for spectators.\u201d<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Orbcomm\u2019s 11 second-generation OG2 satellites are pictured inside Sierra Nevada\u2019s factory in Louisville, Colorado. Credit: Sierra Nevada Corp. The first shipment of Orbcomm\u2019s 11-satellite payload for the Falcon 9 rocket\u2019s first flight since a June launch failure has arrived at Cape Canaveral, and the rest of the spacecraft will reach the Florida spaceport in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[479,3842,3628,2397,316,1611],"class_list":["post-15941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-falcon-9","tag-orbcomm","tag-orbcomm-2","tag-sierra-nevada","tag-spacex","tag-telecom"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15941"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15941\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}