Wed, Apr 17, 2019
Landed Safely, But Fell Aboard The 'Of Course I Still Love You' Barge Returning To Port Canaveral
Rough seas caused damage to the SpaceX Falcon Heavy center core after the second flight for the large rocket.
The company launched the Arabsat-6A communications satellite in its first commercial flight for Falcon Heavy. The two outer boosters landed safely back at Cape Canaveral, but the center core, which landed on the "Of Course I Still Love You" barge in the Atlantic Ocean, tumbled over on the autonomous ship in heavy seas on its return to Port Canaveral in Florida.
Space.com reports that the barge has a mechanism called an "octagrabber" that is used to secure the booster to the ship for transport. But the Falcon Heavy configuration is somewhat different to the Falcon 9 that the barge was designed to support, and it does not secure the center booster in the same way. "Over the weekend, due to rough sea conditions, SpaceX's recovery team was unable to secure the center core booster for its return trip to Port Canaveral," SpaceX representatives said in an emailed statement. "As conditions worsened with 8- to 10-foot swells, the booster began to shift and ultimately was unable to remain upright. While we had hoped to bring the booster back intact, the safety of our team always takes precedence. We do not expect future missions to be impacted."
SpaceX founder Elon Musk said that the booster engines appeared to be undamaged, but it was not made clear how much of the first stage was still aboard the barge.
SpaceX Also recovered the upper stage fairings that protected the satellite during the initial boost phase of the flight. The company plans to reuse tose fairings, as well as the two side boosters that were successfully recovered, for a future flight.
This is the first time SpaceX has had an incident with one of its boosters after successfully landing it on the barge. On the Falcon Heavy test flight last year, the center booster missed the barge and crashed into the ocean. Others earlier in the program crashed onto the barge rather than touching down as planned. SpaceX has modifications in the works to accommodate the Falcon Heavy configuration, but the changes were not completed before Thursday's launch.
(Image provided by SpaceX)
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