BREAKING: SpaceX Rocket , on way to ISS, Suffers Set Back - Thrusters Not Working.

SPACEX WORKING TO FIX DRAGON CAPSULE'S THRUSTERS

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) -- A commercial vessel carrying a ton of supplies for the International Space Station ran into thruster trouble shortly after liftoff Friday, and flight controllers scrambled to fix the problem.

SpaceX founder Elon Musk said three of the four sets of thrusters on the company's unmanned Dragon capsule did not immediately kick in, delaying the release of the solar panels.

[link to hosted.ap.org]

SpaceX releases statement on Dragon problems

[link to www.bnowire.com]

Live mission statements here: [link to spaceflightnow.com]

ill pull a biden "one word ed dames"

SpaceX almost failed catastrophically shortly after launch!!!


[link to www.youtube.com]


[/youtube] [link to www.youtube.com]



watch starting at 1:22 up until about 1:55 !


The contrail should be a smooth curved line, not writhing back and forth like it is. Thats the rocket engines gimballing back and forth trying to straighten the rocket.

The rocket engines onboard it have a gimbal(single pivit point) that allows the engines to move around and direct the thrust in various directions to keep the rocket going straight. It had to go into major gimbal action to keep the rocket from destruction. Moreso than Ive ever seen on a rocket that did not destruct. The rocket was basically writhing back and forth like a snake at that point.

I thought they were going to lose it. The engines were working side to side to near maximum gimbal movement and speed at that point in order to try and correct for the back and forth of the rocket.

scary

SpaceX almost failed catastrophically shortly after launch!!!


[link to www.youtube.com]


[/youtube] [link to www.youtube.com]

/\ Im not sure why the youtube imbed isnt working right

ah, back to the drawing board

Could this be what Ed Dames was referring to? After the NK nuke test and before the kill shot?

Update:

Mission control just radioed the space station crew an update on the Dragon status.

NASA's spacecraft communicator in Houston said SpaceX is still working through issues in the Dragon's propulsion system, and the mission's first rendezvous burn was delayed at least one orbit to about 2 p.m. EST (1900 GMT).

"If completed and if the propulsion system can be confirmed operationally functional, the grapple time tomorrow will not be affected," mission control told the crew.

Space station commander Kevin Ford responded: "That's space exploration for you. We sometimes have problems and work through them, and that's how you learn."

"If not tomorrow, maybe a couple of days down the road we'll get it licked."

Hope so

SpaceX almost failed catastrophically shortly after launch!!!


[link to www.youtube.com]


[/youtube] [link to www.youtube.com]

If you look at the vid at 1:25 you can see 2 puffs of smoke i don't think that is normal.

Dragon's rendezvous with the space station will not be tomorrow, mission control just told the lab's commander.

"They are making progress recovering their prop system, but it's not going to be in time to support the rendezvous and capture for tomorrow," NASA's spacecraft communicator told the crew. "So that is not going to happen tomorrow."

"OK, copy, sounds like another off-duty day for us," replied space station commander Kevin Ford. "We don't wish that. We wish it gets fixed and gets up here to us. That's really awesome they're working their way through the problems. That's what it's all about."

SpaceX hopes they can recover the faulty thruster system in time to support another rendezvous attempt in the next few days.

Here is a rocket engine test firing and showing the gimbal movement.


[link to www.youtube.com]

Planned SpaceX Dragon docking at International Space Station Saturday postponed; NASA news briefing scheduled for 3 pm -

[link to twitter.com]

Team has recovered all quads, Pressure in tanks is what was causing issue all tanks are at nnoninal pressure

Quads 2 & 3 thursters not operationg right now but will be testing to make sure all is well. 1 & 4 up and running

3 or 4 quads need to operate around ISS looks like 4 quads are up now. Will look at check valves & make sure operating

[link to twitter.com]