Rising oxygen temps due to hold for boat and helium bubble triggered alarm”, tweeted Elon Musk, the founder and head of the company.
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US-based SpaceX has aborted the launch of a SES-9 commercial communications satellite aboard its Falcon 9 rocket immediately before lift-off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, marking the third delay since last week.
The launch goal is to shuttle the SES-9 satellite into geostationary orbit, followed by SpaceX’s attempt to land its Falcon 9 rocket onto a floating barge in the Atlantic Ocean. This is very heavy, it will take Falcon 9 more fuel than usual, returning to Earth is made more hard, it may run out of fuel to start its retro-rockets that should enable it to ask gently.
SpaceX has already successfully landed the rocket on the ground, but the variables of the sea landing, including the precise location of the barge and the rate of descent, make the task much more hard. The fuel mix is cooled up to 50 degrees lower than usual – down to minus 340 degrees in the case of the cryogenic liquid oxygen – to densify the liquids closer to their freezing points. Thus, it gives SpaceX a bit more breathing room in the fuel department when attempting first stage rocket landings. On SpaceX’s live webcast, spokesperson John Insprucker said their countdown got all the way down to nearly T-0 when they chose to abort the launch at 7:21 p.m.
The launch was first delayed by a boat downrange of the Cape Canaveral launch site, which may have caused problems leading to the shut-down. Musk explained minutes before the launch the number of corrections that were made to the design after the explosion. It was the third time that the company postponed the launch of the satellite. The satellite will be used for communications services to broadcasters, Internet service providers, mobile and fixed network operators, and business and governmental organizations worldwide.
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SpaceX then called off its second attempt at the satellite-delivery mission on Thursday because of last minute technical difficulties. A tweet from the Air Force’s 45th Space Wing indicated that the next launch date wouldn’t likely be until the first of March or later.
