Posted on 03/03/2023 1:01:33 PM PST by Red Badger
The company is no longer flying the flawed Rocket 3 line that made its last flight in June 2022, when it failed to deliver two NASA cubesats to orbit after a second-stage failure.
A "runaway event" caused the catastrophic loss of Astra's final Rocket 3 launch last June, the company announced Wednesday (March 1).
Astra's Launch Vehicle 0010 lost two NASA hurricane-tracking cubesats on June 12, 2022 after a second-stage failure of its booster, called Rocket 3.3. The overall Rocket 3 line, facing a reported five failures in seven launches, was canceled in August; Astra is working to make improvements for a more powerful Rocket 4 version.
"This was easily the most complex investigation that Astra has ever conducted," read a joint statement concerning the mishap(opens in new tab) from Astra co-founder Adam London, along with head of mission assurance Andrew Griggs.
NASA had tapped Astra to launch six Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation structure and storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats (TROPICS) cubesats in a $7.95 million(opens in new tab) deal for the company. After the rocket's loss, NASA said in October it would seek alternate vendors to get all six satellites to space by end of 2023.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
CALL ELON MUSK ?????
“ CALL ELON MUSK ?????”
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They should have done that for the original mission.
In the last week Musk has put 4 astronauts on the ISS and launched 3 more batches of Starlink sats. Over 100 consecutive successful 1st stage recoveries. NASA still just throws them in the ocean.
Brings to mind a comment by the CEO of Controlled Demolition Inc. (CDI), who said “our competition usually takes themselves out.”
Of all their successes, it’s those 1st stage recovery landings that still make my jaw drop open !
Probably, diversity and wokeness played some role in these continuing failures...
Just a quick ansicht...
Me too. That’s the stuff from ‘50s scifi.
Fly SpaceX. Expensive but worth it.
Its at least $50 million profit every time they do it right.
They land it in the tiny circle just about every time.
Quite the incentive then, eh?
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