Author Topic: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.  (Read 154381 times)

Offline Jason Davies

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #180 on: 02/24/2009 11:53 am »
First failure under the watch of NASA LSP

Wow, I thought the failed Delta II would have been under LSP, or was that USAF and LSP didn't start until later?

Feel sorry for Antonio.

Offline William Graham

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #181 on: 02/24/2009 11:59 am »
First failure under the watch of NASA LSP

Wow, I thought the failed Delta II would have been under LSP, or was that USAF and LSP didn't start until later?

Feel sorry for Antonio.

The Delta II failure was a USAF GPS launch. The partial failure was a commercial launch. Neither carried a NASA payload.

The last launch failure of a major unmanned orbital NASA mission was QuickTOMS, also on a Taurus, in 2001. This was also the last failure out of Vandenberg.

The last failure of an orbital launch carrying NASA payloads of any type was the third Falcon 1 in August 2008, carrying the NanoSail and PreSat CubeSats for NASA, and the ALV-X1 sounding rocket is the most recent NASA launch failure of any description.
« Last Edit: 02/24/2009 12:12 pm by GW_Simulations »

Offline Jim

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #182 on: 02/24/2009 12:00 pm »
First failure under the watch of NASA LSP

Wow, I thought the failed Delta II would have been under LSP, or was that USAF and LSP didn't start until later?


Both.
A.  It was USAF
B.  It was before LSP

56/57 is not bad.  Don't know if it is statistically different than other "users", i.e. DOD and commercial
« Last Edit: 02/24/2009 12:05 pm by Jim »

Offline Satori

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #183 on: 02/24/2009 12:05 pm »
Anomaly Press Briefing coming up...

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #184 on: 02/24/2009 12:09 pm »
Prelim indications that fairing failed to separate. Did not reach orbit.

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #185 on: 02/24/2009 12:11 pm »
7 seconds after stage 2 ignition, expected to see separation, indications that sequence was sent, but shortly after got feedback that fairing did not separate.

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #186 on: 02/24/2009 12:12 pm »
These guys look understandably shattered.

Chuck D: Fairing sep failure still the initial thought. Minor issues during countdown (general). Flight normal. After Stage 2 we expected fairing sep. indications that sequence was sent, but no separation.
« Last Edit: 02/24/2009 12:12 pm by Chris Bergin »
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Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #187 on: 02/24/2009 12:12 pm »
Fairing separates by sequence of electrical pulses that drives ordnance. Two primary and two redundant pulses separate the fairing rails (vertical part.) 80 milliseconds later, base joint is separated by 2/2 pulses as well. Confirmed that the sequence was sent, we had good power, and had healthy electronics box that sent the signal.

Offline Satori

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #188 on: 02/24/2009 12:13 pm »

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #189 on: 02/24/2009 12:14 pm »
When fairing comes off, little wires that are looped back break. We did not get indications that those broke. Temps did not change after it should have separated. And fairing is pretty heavy, so jump in acceleration. We did not get that jump.

Likely landed just short of Antarctica in the ocean.

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #190 on: 02/24/2009 12:15 pm »
Vehicle could not reach orbit due to having to carry the fairing (heavy) through the rest of the flight, and the vehicle has splashed down somewhere near Antarctica.
« Last Edit: 02/24/2009 12:16 pm by Chris Bergin »
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Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #191 on: 02/24/2009 12:15 pm »
1st q on confidence of it's reentry point, he's very certain it did not overfly land and ended up near Antarctica. We'll know more tomorrow.

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #192 on: 02/24/2009 12:16 pm »
2nd question - was it being monitored by P3?

Yes.

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #193 on: 02/24/2009 12:19 pm »
Any hazardous materials on board?

Some hydrazine.

Anything new with this fairing?

No.

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #194 on: 02/24/2009 12:20 pm »
Those local reporters are clued up. Good questions.
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Offline elmarko

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #195 on: 02/24/2009 12:27 pm »
Looks like some technical problems with the audio feeds from HQ.

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #196 on: 02/24/2009 12:31 pm »
Q: How far did this put things behind for studying Earth?

A: We spent 9 years developing OCO. But Japan launched satellite that makes complementary measurements, so algorithms from that can be used combined with other sensors on orbit.

Offline elmarko

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #197 on: 02/24/2009 12:31 pm »
Are the Vandenberg reporters always that clued up? Those were some great questions.
« Last Edit: 02/24/2009 12:32 pm by elmarko »

Offline rdale

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Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #198 on: 02/24/2009 12:35 pm »
If they went to a launch as "low profile" as this, then they probably aren't your generic reporter being sent to cover a "that NASA stuff."

Note the AP didn't have the launch failure announcement for well over an hour... We'd run the story once before I noticed and told the producer that it was a failure, but she sent me another update from AP talking about the good launch.

Offline Chris Bergin

Re: FAILED: Taurus XL - OCO - Feb 23/24, 09.
« Reply #199 on: 02/24/2009 12:35 pm »
So to recap. Fairing failed to sep. Vehicle would have gained some delta V with a nominal loss of the fairing. Thus could not get into orbit. Splashed down near Antarctica. Wouldn't of mattered if it could have got into orbit due to lack of power with the fairing surrounding it.
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