Cape Canaveral, Florida.- A SpaceX rocket has failed for the first time in nearly a decade, leaving the company’s internet satellites in such a low orbit that they will eventually fall through the atmosphere and catch fire.
The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from California on Thursday evening, carrying 20 Starlink satellites. After a few minutes of flight, the upper stage engine failed. On Friday, SpaceX blamed the incident on a liquid oxygen leak.
The company said flight controllers managed to make contact with half of the satellites and attempted to boost them into a higher orbit using onboard ion thrusters. However, since the lower end of their orbit was just 135 kilometers (84 miles) above Earth — less than half of what was intended — “our maximum available thrust is unlikely to be sufficient to successfully lift the satellites,” the company said on the X social network.
SpaceX said the satellites would re-enter the atmosphere and burn up. It did not say when they might come back down. More than 6,000 Starlink satellites in orbit are currently providing internet service to customers in some of the most remote corners of the world.
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said the problem must be resolved before Falcon rockets can fly again.
It is not immediately clear if or how the accident would impact SpaceX’s next manned flights. A spaceflight for billionaires from Florida is scheduled for July 31, with plans for the first private spacewalk, followed in mid-August by an astronaut flight to the International Space Station for NASA.
The tech entrepreneur who led the private flight, Jared Isaacman, said Friday that SpaceX’s Falcon 9 has “an incredible track record” as well as an emergency escape system.
The last failed launch occurred in 2015, on a cargo trip to the space station. Another rocket exploded the following year while undergoing ground testing.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk said the high flight rate will make it easier to identify and correct the problem.
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