SpaceX has been regularly landing Falcon 9 booster rockets for reuse, but so far, the fairings (the nose cone that covers the payload cargo) have been falling hard into the ocean. SpaceX will attempt to salvage one on the next Falcon 9 flight on Thu, Feb 22 using a giant net!
After the successful Falcon Heavy launch earlier this month, Elon Musk said — “We've got a special boat to catch the fairing... it's like a giant catcher's mitt in boat form... I think it might be able to do the same thing with Dragon."
That is what the new boat, named Mr. Steven, will attempt to do this week. If all goes well, the fairing halves will glide down using GPS-equipped steerable parachutes and land right into the net. And get prepared for a new flight, saving millions of dollars in launch costs.
Here is a picture of Mr. Steven, with the net installed.
At a height of about 100 km, the Falcon 9 fairing separates from the second state rocket, traveling at Mach 10. Each of the two 1000-kg half-shells tumbles down at high speeds; cold nitrogen thrusters will be used to stabilize the awkward-shaped fairing piece and orient it into a more aerodynamic posture. After it has fallen to an altitude of about 8 km and has slowed down considerably by atmospheric drag, a GPS-equipped steerable parachute (parafoil) will be deployed which will “gently” guide the fairing into the waiting arms of the capture ship.
Most likely, only one of the fairing halves will be recovered in this mission, unless Mr. Steven is agile enough to catch both.
Here is a schematic of the Falcon Heavy flight earlier this month, showing the sequence of booster and fairing separations and landings (the fairing landing did not take place, there is no Mr. Steven on the East coast).
Here is a simulation of an earlier flight by Zach, illustrating the steps in the landing of the fairing. The boat used in this analysis uses a “giant bouncy castle” rather than a net. Elon Musk had stated in April 2017 about faring recovery — “So what we'll have is kind of like a bouncy castle for it to land on, and aim to reuse the fairing as well."
An earlier concept used helicopters to capture the fairings dangling from their parachutes.
The Fairing
SpaceX's payload fairing, used on both Falcon Heavy and Falcon 9, is a composite structure that protects satellites during delivery to low-Earth orbit (LEO), geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO), and beyond. The fairing is 13.1 meters (43 feet) high and 5.2 meters (17 feet) wide. It consists of an aluminum honeycomb core with carbon-fiber face sheets fabricated in two half-shells. Each half-shell weights about 1000 kg. www.spacex.com/…
The fairing costs about $6 million, hence the motivation to recover and reuse them.
Here is a beautiful video from SpaceX taken by a camera inside a fairing as it fell back to Earth, from a previous Falcon 9 flight.
The Falcon 9 Flight This Week
The Falcon 9 rocket will carry a Spanish military Earth Observation satellite called PAZ, along with two SpaceX prototype communications satellites, from SLC-4E at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. These two test satellites are part of SpaceX’s plan to launch thousands of LEO satellites which will enable broadband Internet access around the globe. According to Musk, the name of the satellite constellation - Starlink - was inspired by John Green's novel A Fault in Our Stars.
The Falcon 9’s first stage for the PAZ mission previously supported the FORMOSAT-5 mission from SLC-4E in August 2017. SpaceX will not attempt to recover Falcon 9’s first stage after launch.
Following Mr. Steven
You can follow Mr. Steven at the following maritime traffic site — www.marinetraffic.com/…
Launch Progress
The Wed, Feb 21 launch has been scrubbed due to weather. Next launch opportunity — 6:17 am PST, Thu, Feb 22.
The launch can be seen live on youtube and at www.spacex.com/… starting ~20 minutes before launch.
Successful deployment of satellites -
Elon trying to catch the fairing —
Missed it :( But he will catch it the next time. We are in uncharted waters.
Successful deployment of SpaceX Starlink demo satellites — Tintin A & B -
Some pictures of the fairing being transported back -
Epilogue
These are exciting times for space exploration (in spite of the troglodytes in the WH and the GOP). And SpaceX flights never fail to be interesting and inspiring. Kudos to the rocket scientists, engineers and staff at work at SpaceX, NASA and other space organizations and universities.
P.S. A new SpaceX drone ship for landing boosters is called “A Shortfall of Gravitas”. I will let readers point out the significance of that name.
Further Reading
- SpaceX’s claw-boat ready to recover rocket fairing with a giant net — www.teslarati.com/…
- Mr. Steven vessel details — www.marinetraffic.com/...
- A Beautiful Rocket Launch — www.dailykos.com/...
- Falcon Heavy is Ready for Liftoff — www.dailykos.com/…
- Live from Space - the Tesla Roadster with Starman — www.dailykos.com/…
- Space Exploration - The Year Ahead (2018) — www.dailykos.com/...
- TESS the Exoplanet Hunter — www.dailykos.com/…