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Satellite burns up following SpaceX rocket glitch

168 points by hornokplease 14y ago

ProCynic 14y ago
That's what space launch insurance is for I guess.
alanh 14y ago
Wow, I hope everyone reads the article before commenting. It’s still amazingly successful. There was a 95% chance the satellite would have made it if they tried, but they were obligated not to try if there were less than a 99% chance of success. (The reduced chance was due to the loss of one of the 9 engines.) And, of course, the primary mission to the space station was fully successful (the engine glitch notwithstanding).
- danielweber 14y ago
  It wasn't a 95%/99% of the satellite making it; those were the chances that there wouldn't be an incident with the ISS if the upper stage activated. The Falcon 9 ended up in a slightly different position/velocity than was expected, and the primary mission (deliver to the ISS and don't dare run anything into it) took complete priority over the secondary mission of launching the other satellite into a high orbit.
  - vl 14y ago
    Article says the opposite: if there was not at least a 99 percent chance that the rocket had enough fuel to complete the burn
    - danielweber 14y ago
      That simply doesn't make sense. The OrbComm satellite was almost sure to burn up if they didn't launch it from a higher orbit. If the only risk was to the satellite, then go high or go home. The problem was a (very small, almost surely overstated, but there nonetheless) risk to the ISS. From Orbcomm's press release: "the rocket did not comply with a preplanned International Space Station (ISS) safety gate to allow it to execute the second burn."
- vl 14y ago
  It's unclear to me what is the risk to ISS. Secondary payload was on the much lower orbit, and even if it was on the same orbital plane, they could just slightly change orbit plane, and try to raise the obit with any chance of success entirely safe for ISS.
  - tsotha 14y ago
    It's probably mostly a theoretical risk. On the other hand, I recall a flight to Mir that ended up slamming into the station. And NASA doesn't have any reason to accept a risk that doesn't benefit its operations.
    - meepmorp 14y ago
      > And NASA doesn't have any reason to accept a risk that doesn't benefit its operations. Goodwill in the space community and helping to defray costs of future launches by making commercial launches more successful (and thus less expensive, if only for insurance purposes) seem like things that benefit their operations. Perhaps this is a naive opinion, though.
      - ramidarigaz 14y ago
        I agree, and I think NASA does too. They're just really conservative about the safety of the ISS (understandably so).
        ktizo 14y ago
        In risk terms, the satellite that was ditched is worth absolutely nothing compared to the ISS. The ISS is the single most important thing humans have in space at the moment. Purely on the basis that the new trajectory can't be gone over with a pin, even if all the maths comes out saying that everything is lovely, you do not refire an ISS delivery rocket that is not where you expected it to be, especially one that has already sustained damage, just to test a new robot.
      - SoftwareMaven 14y ago
- tomrod 14y ago
  I agree with your comment. I wanted you to know that I fatfingered the up vote... And gave you a downvote. I apologize. Here's to many, many more private space successes!
ramidarigaz 14y ago
Shame. It doesn't sound like Orbcomm is too disappointed though. They were aware of the risks, and they did get to test some of the systems.
- joez 14y ago
  Actually, sounds like Orbcomm got a heck of a deal. They get insurance money and in addition to getting a few tests off on the prototype.
  - ramidarigaz 14y ago
    Hah. Good point. A couple days of free testing in space isn't a bad deal at all.
- joez 14y ago
  Actually, sounds like Orbcomm got a heck of a deal. They get insurance money and in addition to getting a few tests off on the prototype.
martinkallstrom 14y ago
It is perfectly clear that this is a story of safety margines adhered to in an admirably strict fashion; not allowing short term thinking rule over long term; and certainly not allowing marketing rule over engineering. This is how you move mountains.
- codex 14y ago
  It should; all of the material quotes in this article came from a SpaceX public relations agent and not from independent space analysts. Not exactly objective. The only quote from Orbicomm is practically a tautology.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
    - aeontech 14y ago
      You are mixing your terms I think. (2/4)^3 is the chances of the next launch also having a single engine failure. The chances of a single engine failing in a launch based on these four launches should be 2/36, two engines failed out of 36 fired total. So, assuming that a single engine failure does not increase failure chance of nearby engines (which is not true probably), and assuming past performance is indicator of future performance, and discounting all the test fires that they have done with the rocket, the formula should look more like the following: Chances of any given 3 engines failing is the inverse of the chances of at least two engines failing at the same time. Chances of at least two engines failing equals no engines failing + 1 engine failing + 2 engines failing Based on current engine failure rate, that's (17/18)^9 + (1/18)^8 + C(9,2) * (1/18)^2 * (17/18)^7 where C(9,2) = 9!/(2! 7!) = 36 So that looks more like 98.88% chance of two or fewer engines failing, the converse of which is about 0.02% chance of a triple or more failure. (math is not my strong suit, please correct me if I'm wrong, but #math on IRC thought this looked correct).
      - ordinary 14y ago
        > Based on current engine failure rate, that's (17/18)^9 + (1/18)^8 + C(9,2) * (1/18)^2 * (17/18)^7 I think the second part of that calculation is incorrect. I'm getting: P(0 engine fail) = (17/18)^9 ~= 0.5978 P(1 engine fail) = (17/18)^8 * (1/18) * C(9,1) ~= 0.3165 P(2 engine fail) = (17/18)^7 * (1/18)^2 * C(9,2) ~= 0.0745 Adding those together gives: P(<=2 engine fail) = (17/18)^9 + (17/18)^8 / 2 + (17/18)^7 / 9 ~= 0.9888 That's the same answer you came up with, so I guess you have the correct calculation written down somewhere. Moving to 3 or more engine fails then gives: P(>=3 engine fail) = 1 - P(<=2 engine fail) ~= 0.0112
tarice 14y ago
So, essentially, a company sends a satellite into space, tests it a lot, and then charges an insurance company $10 million because they expected it to fall into the atmosphere? What insurance company lets a company take out a plan with that kind of risk? Seems like NASA should've been getting insurance plans for the shuttle's External Tank all these years.
- ramidarigaz 14y ago
  They didn't expect it to fall. They were aware that their satellite was a secondary payload and would be abandoned if need be. I don't think anyone expected the Falcon 9 to lose an engine.
  - tarice 14y ago
    From the article: > "Orbcomm understood from the beginning that the orbit-raising maneuver was tentative," Nelson wrote. "They accepted that there was a high risk of their satellite remaining at the Dragon insertion orbit. SpaceX would not have agreed to fly their satellite otherwise, since this was not part of the core mission and there was a known, material risk of no altitude raise." High risk, to me, says that there was a pretty good chance it was gonna fall.
    - ramidarigaz 14y ago
      The beginning being as soon as they knew their satellite had been deposited well below the desired altitude. If the F9 engine hadn't failed, they wouldn't have needed to do an orbit raising maneuver at all and there would have been no risk of the satellite deorbiting.
      - tarice 14y ago
        A orbit raising maneuver was always necessary to get the satellite to its target. Relevant sections: > "Orbcomm had planned on reaching an altitude of 466 miles above Earth..." > "Due to the engine shutdown, the Falcon 9 used slightly more fuel and oxygen to reach Dragon's intended 202 mile- (325-km) high orbit. Over the next 2.5 days, Dragon flew itself to the station's orbit 250 miles above Earth. It reached the $100 billion outpost, a project of 15 countries, on Wednesday." Initial Dragon Orbit: 202 miles above Earth ISS: 250 miles above Earth Desired Satellite Location: 466 miles above Earth There was only a 95% chance of the rocket reaching the location 466 miles above Earth (due to the reduced fuel reserves), so they didn't perform the burn, because NASA's contract with them forbade it (had to be >=99% chance of success).
natep 14y ago
To be sure, this is not a good outcome, but improper orbit insertion is a serious risk on every rocket launch, whether or not it's SpaceX and whether or not you're the primary payload. I'm glad to see that all parties involved realized this and Orbcomm planned accordingly. It would make little sense to accept the increased risk that a secondary payload status entails and to not be prepared for the consequences. And SpaceX behaved just as any other launch vehicle provider would in that situation. They gave their best effort to the secondary payload, but in the end, sacrificed it in order to achieve their primary mission.
NDizzle 14y ago
Note to self: Don't start a space mission insurance company.
- pjscott 14y ago
  If you don't have enough capital to take a few hits, don't start any kind of insurance company. If you do have the money, though, it should be the same basic principle as any other insurance company: calculate the risk as best you can, and charge accordingly so that the expected value of your profit is as positive as the market will bear.
United857 14y ago
Did the satellite self-destruct or something? The article seems to imply the rocket and payload reached its first goal orbit of 202 miles (to deliver another separate payload to the ISS). At that altitude, while short of the 466 miles desired, it still should have taken months or years for the orbit to decay and re-enter the atmosphere!
- david_shaw 14y ago
  The primary objective was to reach the ISS, which it did successfully. From there, it was to launch the satellite. From the article: > To ensure the station's safety, the agreement with NASA prohibited Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX as the privately-held California-based company is known, from restarting the rocket's second stage - needed to deliver Orbcomm's satellite to its proper orbit - if there was not at least a 99 percent chance that the rocket had enough fuel to complete the burn, said SpaceX spokeswoman Katherine Nelson. Because there was less than a 99% chance of success, SpaceX followed procedures and did not attempt to launch the satellite.
- reitzensteinm 14y ago
  Altitude alone isn't enough for orbit - it also needs sufficient velocity in the right direction, which presumably it didn't have. A stationary object placed 466 miles above the earth would just fall down.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- 46Bit 14y ago
  The launch would be to an orbit that would decay in a short-ish time (perhaps fairly elliptical?), since SpaceX wouldn't want to leave the second stage up there long term as yet another large piece of space debris. Talking from the knowledge of a hobbyist here though, rather than an expert on such matters, so probably wrong on some counts.
robomartin 14y ago
Failure is a part of every human activity worth pursuing. What we do when we fail is what defines us. Looking at the big picture, this mission was nothing but a success. Unless I am wrong, this is the first privately built rocket to deliver cargo to the Space Station. Right? And they achieved this while loosing one engine. High five! It sounds like everyone involved with the Satellite portion of the mission knew full-well what the risks were and that they had no priority over the main mission. Insurance covered it. Done deal. All is well. SpaceX can only get better from here. Kudos.
checoivan 14y ago
Title should be: SpaceX Falcon9 manages to reach its destination despite the engine failure, delivers a pack of home made ice cream.
- keypusher 14y ago
  Agreed. The text of this article does not match the headline at all.
tocomment 14y ago
I never understood why this company couldn't make do with the orbit spacex left it in?
- mikeash 14y ago
  No, orbit isn't orbit. Among many other considerations, the key problem here was that the initial orbit was low enough for atmospheric drag to be a factor, thus why it fell back to Earth after just a few days.
  - mturmon 14y ago
    And specifically, being underpowered, the orbit was probably highly elliptical.
asalazar 14y ago
In the words of the great philosopher, Homer-- "Doh!",
confluence 14y ago
> Among the Dragon's cargo was a freezer that will be used to store scientific samples. For the ride up, SpaceX stashed chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream inside. Just awesome. The mission was a success. The satellite maker's loss was covered with insurance money, the ISS stays up in the sky, engine-out capability proven, subsequent launch contracts remain in place from both NASA/the satellite maker - and the ISS astronauts get home-made chocolate ice cream! Win-win-win. The only entity that got screwed was the insurance company, but that was a risk they were willing to take and were duly paid for doing so.
- danielweber 14y ago
  The primary mission was a success. The secondary mission was a failure. $10 million probably covers Orbcomm's launch costs. SpaceX is awesome, but this isn't an unqualified win. There are groups out for SpaceX's head and they will try (unsuccessfully, I hope) to use this "engine incident" against them. SpaceX did not want this to happen at all.
  - sylvinus 14y ago
    They shure didn't want this to happen but they also demonstrated they were able to manage engine failure. That's worth something for the future.
  - archgoon 14y ago
    What groups? I haven't heard of any opposition to SpaceX. Heck, NASA contracts with them.
    - danielweber 14y ago
      http://news.yahoo.com/spacexs-elon-musk-bemoans-opposition-commercial-space-220100731.html http://news.yahoo.com/spacexs-elon-musk-bemoans-opposition-c... talks a bit about it some. SpaceX is dramatically lowering the cost of space launch. They are eating the lunch of dinosaur space companies who are only too happy to apply FUD that SpaceX is being "too cheap." There's a lot of money on the table being consumed by people who just have to keep on doing what they are doing and don't like competition.
jamesmcn 14y ago
Assuming that the insurance company actually pays out, this seems like a win for both SpaceX and OrbComm. SpaceX got a paying commercial customer, and had an opportunity to test out yet another part of the Falcon stack. OrbComm got a bit of testing time on their new communication platform at less than the cost of a full launch. If the insurance company is structured properly, this is a loss for them, but will average out over time. Compare with the age of sail, where a mission was considered successful if one the ships actually returned. Even with 75% of the crew dead and 25% toothless and malnourished from scurvy and other ailments.
- jameshart 14y ago
  Well yes - it's frankly impressive enough that it's possible to get insurance to cover putting your satellite on one of SpaceX's rockets. Speaks well to the future of private space travel that there are institutions willing to take that bet, at a price commercial customers of SpaceX are evidently willing to pay.
  - pilom 14y ago
    Last I looked, insurance premiums on spaceflight were on the order of 20-25% of insured value of the payload. So if it were a $10 million payout Orbcomm probably paid out 2 million in insurance pre launch.
  - lbcadden3 14y ago
    You can get insurance for anything if you are willing to pay the premium.
beefman 14y ago
Unusually clear and detailed article from Reuters. Kudos to Ms. Klotz.
cryptoz 14y ago
sehugg 14y ago
Apparently SpaceX weren't the only ones with engine problems this week. The Delta 4 launch had some anomalies as well. Hard engineering is hard. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/11/satellite-investigation-idUSL1E8LBKPQ20121011?type=marketsNews http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/11/satellite-investig...
nkurz 14y ago
Due to the engine shutdown, the Falcon 9 used slightly more fuel and oxygen to reach Dragon's intended 202 mile- (325-km) high orbit. For the ride up, SpaceX stashed chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream inside. the amount of liquid oxygen "was only enough to achieve a roughly 95 percent likelihood of completing the second burn..." 882 pounds (400 kg) of cargo aboard the Dragon capsule The cynic in my wonders: would they have calculated a 99% likelihood if they hadn't sent the ice cream and had about .1% less cargo?
- zachalexander 14y ago
  Falcon 9: 333,450 kg Dragon: 4,200 kg Cargo: 905 kg Ice cream: <5 kg, I'm guessing Skipping the ice cream would've reduced their total mass by <0.001% or so, at least at launchtime.
  - nkurz 14y ago
    Appreciate the response, and think you're probably right. I'd be interested in better numbers, though. It's not the mass of the ice cream that't the problem, but the fuel necessary to get that mass to orbit. I think that's about 10x. And it's the percentage of weight at altitude that matters, since that's where the maneuvering was being done, which brings the weight down by about 90%. That's why I was guessing it was a .1% increase, but don't know for sure.
jamesmcn 14y ago
After some further digging, it appears that insurance was at a low back in March. The article discusses the danger of a major failure, such as an Ariane 5 which could be covered at $750 million or a Proton which can carry $400 million worth of cargo. This $10 million loss shouldn't be too big of a deal for the space insurance world. http://www.spacenews.com/satellite_telecom/120302-falling-sat-insurance-premiums-market-risk.html http://www.spacenews.com/satellite_telecom/120302-falling-sa...
jordanthoms 14y ago
Is there an explanation somewhere (preferably with a diagram) of how this launch was supposed to work? I'm not sure where the satellite was attached, and how the upper stage was supposed to boost it - was it going to drop the dragon off at one orbit and then continue higher and release the satellite?
revelation 14y ago
Can someone clarify this for me? Why does the contract with NASA forbid them to restart the engine unless they have a 99% chance of completing a second burn? Is the problem here that if you start a second burn and have to end it prematurely, you could end up in an orbit intersecting the ISS?
- saraid216 14y ago
  As I understand it, that's exactly what it is.
EGreg 14y ago
ice cream!
caycep 14y ago
so the ice cream bit at the end makes it all ok?

168 points by hornokplease 14y ago

That's what space launch insurance is for I guess.

alanh 14y ago

Wow, I hope everyone reads the article before commenting. It’s still amazingly successful. There was a 95% chance the satellite would have made it if they tried, but they were obligated not to try if there were less than a 99% chance of success. (The reduced chance was due to the loss of one of the 9 engines.) And, of course, the primary mission to the space station was fully successful (the engine glitch notwithstanding).

danielweber 14y ago
It wasn't a 95%/99% of the satellite making it; those were the chances that there wouldn't be an incident with the ISS if the upper stage activated. The Falcon 9 ended up in a slightly different position/velocity than was expected, and the primary mission (deliver to the ISS and don't dare run anything into it) took complete priority over the secondary mission of launching the other satellite into a high orbit.
- vl 14y ago
  Article says the opposite: if there was not at least a 99 percent chance that the rocket had enough fuel to complete the burn
  - danielweber 14y ago
    That simply doesn't make sense. The OrbComm satellite was almost sure to burn up if they didn't launch it from a higher orbit. If the only risk was to the satellite, then go high or go home. The problem was a (very small, almost surely overstated, but there nonetheless) risk to the ISS. From Orbcomm's press release: "the rocket did not comply with a preplanned International Space Station (ISS) safety gate to allow it to execute the second burn."
vl 14y ago
It's unclear to me what is the risk to ISS. Secondary payload was on the much lower orbit, and even if it was on the same orbital plane, they could just slightly change orbit plane, and try to raise the obit with any chance of success entirely safe for ISS.
- tsotha 14y ago
  It's probably mostly a theoretical risk. On the other hand, I recall a flight to Mir that ended up slamming into the station. And NASA doesn't have any reason to accept a risk that doesn't benefit its operations.
  - meepmorp 14y ago
    > And NASA doesn't have any reason to accept a risk that doesn't benefit its operations. Goodwill in the space community and helping to defray costs of future launches by making commercial launches more successful (and thus less expensive, if only for insurance purposes) seem like things that benefit their operations. Perhaps this is a naive opinion, though.
    - ramidarigaz 14y ago
      I agree, and I think NASA does too. They're just really conservative about the safety of the ISS (understandably so).
      - ktizo 14y ago
        In risk terms, the satellite that was ditched is worth absolutely nothing compared to the ISS. The ISS is the single most important thing humans have in space at the moment. Purely on the basis that the new trajectory can't be gone over with a pin, even if all the maths comes out saying that everything is lovely, you do not refire an ISS delivery rocket that is not where you expected it to be, especially one that has already sustained damage, just to test a new robot.
    - SoftwareMaven 14y ago
tomrod 14y ago
I agree with your comment. I wanted you to know that I fatfingered the up vote... And gave you a downvote. I apologize. Here's to many, many more private space successes!

ramidarigaz 14y ago

Shame. It doesn't sound like Orbcomm is too disappointed though. They were aware of the risks, and they did get to test some of the systems.

joez 14y ago
Actually, sounds like Orbcomm got a heck of a deal. They get insurance money and in addition to getting a few tests off on the prototype.
- ramidarigaz 14y ago
  Hah. Good point. A couple days of free testing in space isn't a bad deal at all.
joez 14y ago
Actually, sounds like Orbcomm got a heck of a deal. They get insurance money and in addition to getting a few tests off on the prototype.

martinkallstrom 14y ago

It is perfectly clear that this is a story of safety margines adhered to in an admirably strict fashion; not allowing short term thinking rule over long term; and certainly not allowing marketing rule over engineering. This is how you move mountains.

codex 14y ago
It should; all of the material quotes in this article came from a SpaceX public relations agent and not from independent space analysts. Not exactly objective. The only quote from Orbicomm is practically a tautology.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
  - aeontech 14y ago
    You are mixing your terms I think. (2/4)^3 is the chances of the next launch also having a single engine failure. The chances of a single engine failing in a launch based on these four launches should be 2/36, two engines failed out of 36 fired total. So, assuming that a single engine failure does not increase failure chance of nearby engines (which is not true probably), and assuming past performance is indicator of future performance, and discounting all the test fires that they have done with the rocket, the formula should look more like the following: Chances of any given 3 engines failing is the inverse of the chances of at least two engines failing at the same time. Chances of at least two engines failing equals no engines failing + 1 engine failing + 2 engines failing Based on current engine failure rate, that's (17/18)^9 + (1/18)^8 + C(9,2) * (1/18)^2 * (17/18)^7 where C(9,2) = 9!/(2! 7!) = 36 So that looks more like 98.88% chance of two or fewer engines failing, the converse of which is about 0.02% chance of a triple or more failure. (math is not my strong suit, please correct me if I'm wrong, but #math on IRC thought this looked correct).
    - ordinary 14y ago
      > Based on current engine failure rate, that's (17/18)^9 + (1/18)^8 + C(9,2) * (1/18)^2 * (17/18)^7 I think the second part of that calculation is incorrect. I'm getting: P(0 engine fail) = (17/18)^9 ~= 0.5978 P(1 engine fail) = (17/18)^8 * (1/18) * C(9,1) ~= 0.3165 P(2 engine fail) = (17/18)^7 * (1/18)^2 * C(9,2) ~= 0.0745 Adding those together gives: P(<=2 engine fail) = (17/18)^9 + (17/18)^8 / 2 + (17/18)^7 / 9 ~= 0.9888 That's the same answer you came up with, so I guess you have the correct calculation written down somewhere. Moving to 3 or more engine fails then gives: P(>=3 engine fail) = 1 - P(<=2 engine fail) ~= 0.0112

tarice 14y ago

So, essentially, a company sends a satellite into space, tests it a lot, and then charges an insurance company $10 million because they expected it to fall into the atmosphere? What insurance company lets a company take out a plan with that kind of risk? Seems like NASA should've been getting insurance plans for the shuttle's External Tank all these years.

ramidarigaz 14y ago
They didn't expect it to fall. They were aware that their satellite was a secondary payload and would be abandoned if need be. I don't think anyone expected the Falcon 9 to lose an engine.
- tarice 14y ago
  From the article: > "Orbcomm understood from the beginning that the orbit-raising maneuver was tentative," Nelson wrote. "They accepted that there was a high risk of their satellite remaining at the Dragon insertion orbit. SpaceX would not have agreed to fly their satellite otherwise, since this was not part of the core mission and there was a known, material risk of no altitude raise." High risk, to me, says that there was a pretty good chance it was gonna fall.
  - ramidarigaz 14y ago
    The beginning being as soon as they knew their satellite had been deposited well below the desired altitude. If the F9 engine hadn't failed, they wouldn't have needed to do an orbit raising maneuver at all and there would have been no risk of the satellite deorbiting.
    - tarice 14y ago
      A orbit raising maneuver was always necessary to get the satellite to its target. Relevant sections: > "Orbcomm had planned on reaching an altitude of 466 miles above Earth..." > "Due to the engine shutdown, the Falcon 9 used slightly more fuel and oxygen to reach Dragon's intended 202 mile- (325-km) high orbit. Over the next 2.5 days, Dragon flew itself to the station's orbit 250 miles above Earth. It reached the $100 billion outpost, a project of 15 countries, on Wednesday." Initial Dragon Orbit: 202 miles above Earth ISS: 250 miles above Earth Desired Satellite Location: 466 miles above Earth There was only a 95% chance of the rocket reaching the location 466 miles above Earth (due to the reduced fuel reserves), so they didn't perform the burn, because NASA's contract with them forbade it (had to be >=99% chance of success).

natep 14y ago

To be sure, this is not a good outcome, but improper orbit insertion is a serious risk on every rocket launch, whether or not it's SpaceX and whether or not you're the primary payload. I'm glad to see that all parties involved realized this and Orbcomm planned accordingly. It would make little sense to accept the increased risk that a secondary payload status entails and to not be prepared for the consequences. And SpaceX behaved just as any other launch vehicle provider would in that situation. They gave their best effort to the secondary payload, but in the end, sacrificed it in order to achieve their primary mission.

NDizzle 14y ago

Note to self: Don't start a space mission insurance company.

pjscott 14y ago
If you don't have enough capital to take a few hits, don't start any kind of insurance company. If you do have the money, though, it should be the same basic principle as any other insurance company: calculate the risk as best you can, and charge accordingly so that the expected value of your profit is as positive as the market will bear.

United857 14y ago

Did the satellite self-destruct or something? The article seems to imply the rocket and payload reached its first goal orbit of 202 miles (to deliver another separate payload to the ISS). At that altitude, while short of the 466 miles desired, it still should have taken months or years for the orbit to decay and re-enter the atmosphere!

david_shaw 14y ago
The primary objective was to reach the ISS, which it did successfully. From there, it was to launch the satellite. From the article: > To ensure the station's safety, the agreement with NASA prohibited Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX as the privately-held California-based company is known, from restarting the rocket's second stage - needed to deliver Orbcomm's satellite to its proper orbit - if there was not at least a 99 percent chance that the rocket had enough fuel to complete the burn, said SpaceX spokeswoman Katherine Nelson. Because there was less than a 99% chance of success, SpaceX followed procedures and did not attempt to launch the satellite.
reitzensteinm 14y ago
Altitude alone isn't enough for orbit - it also needs sufficient velocity in the right direction, which presumably it didn't have. A stationary object placed 466 miles above the earth would just fall down.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
46Bit 14y ago
The launch would be to an orbit that would decay in a short-ish time (perhaps fairly elliptical?), since SpaceX wouldn't want to leave the second stage up there long term as yet another large piece of space debris. Talking from the knowledge of a hobbyist here though, rather than an expert on such matters, so probably wrong on some counts.

robomartin 14y ago

Failure is a part of every human activity worth pursuing. What we do when we fail is what defines us. Looking at the big picture, this mission was nothing but a success. Unless I am wrong, this is the first privately built rocket to deliver cargo to the Space Station. Right? And they achieved this while loosing one engine. High five! It sounds like everyone involved with the Satellite portion of the mission knew full-well what the risks were and that they had no priority over the main mission. Insurance covered it. Done deal. All is well. SpaceX can only get better from here. Kudos.

checoivan 14y ago

Title should be: SpaceX Falcon9 manages to reach its destination despite the engine failure, delivers a pack of home made ice cream.

keypusher 14y ago
Agreed. The text of this article does not match the headline at all.

tocomment 14y ago

I never understood why this company couldn't make do with the orbit spacex left it in?

mikeash 14y ago
No, orbit isn't orbit. Among many other considerations, the key problem here was that the initial orbit was low enough for atmospheric drag to be a factor, thus why it fell back to Earth after just a few days.
- mturmon 14y ago
  And specifically, being underpowered, the orbit was probably highly elliptical.

asalazar 14y ago

In the words of the great philosopher, Homer-- "Doh!",

confluence 14y ago

> Among the Dragon's cargo was a freezer that will be used to store scientific samples. For the ride up, SpaceX stashed chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream inside. Just awesome. The mission was a success. The satellite maker's loss was covered with insurance money, the ISS stays up in the sky, engine-out capability proven, subsequent launch contracts remain in place from both NASA/the satellite maker - and the ISS astronauts get home-made chocolate ice cream! Win-win-win. The only entity that got screwed was the insurance company, but that was a risk they were willing to take and were duly paid for doing so.

danielweber 14y ago
The primary mission was a success. The secondary mission was a failure. $10 million probably covers Orbcomm's launch costs. SpaceX is awesome, but this isn't an unqualified win. There are groups out for SpaceX's head and they will try (unsuccessfully, I hope) to use this "engine incident" against them. SpaceX did not want this to happen at all.
- sylvinus 14y ago
  They shure didn't want this to happen but they also demonstrated they were able to manage engine failure. That's worth something for the future.
- archgoon 14y ago
  What groups? I haven't heard of any opposition to SpaceX. Heck, NASA contracts with them.
  - danielweber 14y ago
    http://news.yahoo.com/spacexs-elon-musk-bemoans-opposition-commercial-space-220100731.html http://news.yahoo.com/spacexs-elon-musk-bemoans-opposition-c... talks a bit about it some. SpaceX is dramatically lowering the cost of space launch. They are eating the lunch of dinosaur space companies who are only too happy to apply FUD that SpaceX is being "too cheap." There's a lot of money on the table being consumed by people who just have to keep on doing what they are doing and don't like competition.

jamesmcn 14y ago

Assuming that the insurance company actually pays out, this seems like a win for both SpaceX and OrbComm. SpaceX got a paying commercial customer, and had an opportunity to test out yet another part of the Falcon stack. OrbComm got a bit of testing time on their new communication platform at less than the cost of a full launch. If the insurance company is structured properly, this is a loss for them, but will average out over time. Compare with the age of sail, where a mission was considered successful if one the ships actually returned. Even with 75% of the crew dead and 25% toothless and malnourished from scurvy and other ailments.

jameshart 14y ago
Well yes - it's frankly impressive enough that it's possible to get insurance to cover putting your satellite on one of SpaceX's rockets. Speaks well to the future of private space travel that there are institutions willing to take that bet, at a price commercial customers of SpaceX are evidently willing to pay.
- pilom 14y ago
  Last I looked, insurance premiums on spaceflight were on the order of 20-25% of insured value of the payload. So if it were a $10 million payout Orbcomm probably paid out 2 million in insurance pre launch.
- lbcadden3 14y ago
  You can get insurance for anything if you are willing to pay the premium.

beefman 14y ago

Unusually clear and detailed article from Reuters. Kudos to Ms. Klotz.

cryptoz 14y ago

sehugg 14y ago

Apparently SpaceX weren't the only ones with engine problems this week. The Delta 4 launch had some anomalies as well. Hard engineering is hard. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/11/satellite-investigation-idUSL1E8LBKPQ20121011?type=marketsNews http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/11/satellite-investig...

nkurz 14y ago

Due to the engine shutdown, the Falcon 9 used slightly more fuel and oxygen to reach Dragon's intended 202 mile- (325-km) high orbit. For the ride up, SpaceX stashed chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream inside. the amount of liquid oxygen "was only enough to achieve a roughly 95 percent likelihood of completing the second burn..." 882 pounds (400 kg) of cargo aboard the Dragon capsule The cynic in my wonders: would they have calculated a 99% likelihood if they hadn't sent the ice cream and had about .1% less cargo?

zachalexander 14y ago
Falcon 9: 333,450 kg Dragon: 4,200 kg Cargo: 905 kg Ice cream: <5 kg, I'm guessing Skipping the ice cream would've reduced their total mass by <0.001% or so, at least at launchtime.
- nkurz 14y ago
  Appreciate the response, and think you're probably right. I'd be interested in better numbers, though. It's not the mass of the ice cream that't the problem, but the fuel necessary to get that mass to orbit. I think that's about 10x. And it's the percentage of weight at altitude that matters, since that's where the maneuvering was being done, which brings the weight down by about 90%. That's why I was guessing it was a .1% increase, but don't know for sure.

jamesmcn 14y ago

After some further digging, it appears that insurance was at a low back in March. The article discusses the danger of a major failure, such as an Ariane 5 which could be covered at $750 million or a Proton which can carry $400 million worth of cargo. This $10 million loss shouldn't be too big of a deal for the space insurance world. http://www.spacenews.com/satellite_telecom/120302-falling-sat-insurance-premiums-market-risk.html http://www.spacenews.com/satellite_telecom/120302-falling-sa...

jordanthoms 14y ago

Is there an explanation somewhere (preferably with a diagram) of how this launch was supposed to work? I'm not sure where the satellite was attached, and how the upper stage was supposed to boost it - was it going to drop the dragon off at one orbit and then continue higher and release the satellite?

revelation 14y ago

Can someone clarify this for me? Why does the contract with NASA forbid them to restart the engine unless they have a 99% chance of completing a second burn? Is the problem here that if you start a second burn and have to end it prematurely, you could end up in an orbit intersecting the ISS?

saraid216 14y ago
As I understand it, that's exactly what it is.

EGreg 14y ago

ice cream!

caycep 14y ago

so the ice cream bit at the end makes it all ok?