Company Says Return To Flight Still A ‘Couple Of Months Away’

SpaceX will delay its next Falcon 9 launch as it continues to investigate a June 28th accident that resulted in the loss of a booster and a Dragon cargo vessel headed to ISS.

The Los Angeles Times reports that the announcement was made at a scientific forum being held in Pasadena. SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell said that the company is “a couple of months away from the next flight.”

Shotwell said that while the company is taking more time that it had originally expected to begin flying again, “I don’t think any of our customers want us to race to the cliff and fail again.”

After the accident, SpaceX founder Elon Musk said that the company would test every strut on its boosters and not rely on a subcontractor's certification of their strength. The failure of a strut holding down helium tanks in the Falcon 9’s second stage has been identified as the cause of the catastrophic failure of the rocket as it launched.

Last week, NASA administrator Charles Bolden said in a letter to SpaceX that the agency would conduct an “independent review” of the cause of the accident. The agency is allowing the company, which builds its own boosters and rocket motors, to lead the investigation.

SpaceX says it has more than 50 orders for launches worth more than $7 billion on its books. Clients include NASA, the USAF, foreign governments, and commercial satellite companies.

(Image from file)

FMI: www.spacex.com