Author Topic: Falcon 9-R Explosion Mid-Flight at McGregor - August 22, 2014  (Read 257143 times)

Offline Avron

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Right now the fires are the bigger problem
what are the roads like in the area, width, and wouldn't SpaceX have a fire truck of some sort to deal with this potential...



its open land easy to access if you have the keys..  From the above video.. I assume we are looking from the north side

Offline Wetmelon

According to the individual who shot the video, the fire trucks were responding in droves by the time his video went out.  He's a local - contacted us just before checking his cattle lol.

Offline Avron

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Stephen Clark ‏@StephenClark1  2m
SpaceX confirms no injuries after Falcon 9R mishap in McGregor, TX.


Olivia Messer ‏@OliviaMesser  11m
Police aren't telling us much, but Fire Chief Moe Spradley confirmed that they are working to contain any blaze that resulted from explosion
« Last Edit: 08/23/2014 12:22 am by Avron »

Offline Darga

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Offline AJW

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If you look at the last frame of the video (1:01), the fire truck matches this one from the McGregor Fire Department

http://www.fastline.com/v100/McGregor-Fire-Dept-AMI-Fire-BELTON-TX-equipment-detail-43d17815-6b21-45aa-a87b-1379d186d04d.aspx
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Offline matthewkantar

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Seems like it was FTS at work.

Matthew

Offline Asmegin

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http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/spacex-test-flight-explodes-over-texas-town-n186436

A SpaceX prototype rocket automatically detonated after an "anomaly" was detected during a test flight Friday in McGregor, Texas, the company told NBC News Friday night.

Offline Avron

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Video of flight and explosion http://www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/Rocket-Explodes-at-Space-X-272370541.html

"According to witness accounts, the rocket started to head toward nearby homes shortly before it exploded."

Offline deruch

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Pure speculation: failure of new actuators lead to trigger of FTS.  Of course, it could have been a failure of something the rocket has always had (rocketry is hard).

Based on Reisman's statement at AIAA @25m40s, we know that the last flight of F9R-dev.1 (on Aug. 1st) was testing new actuators and new software.  Exactly which "actuators" wasn't elaborated on.  I have 2 theories: 1. This test article has so far been all about the landing tests, so new actuators for the grid fins.  But a failure here is unlikely to lead to total control failure.  They still have the RCS and the stage didn't look like it was very high when it failed (based on pictures).  2. Extrapolating from the recent launch delays of F9v1.1 due to TVC actuator issues (IIRC, at least 1 Orbcomm delay and AsiaSat-8 as well), they could be new thrust vector control actuators on the M1Ds.  An in-flight failure of a new TVC actuator would very likely lead to triggering the FTS on this dev.1 flight.  The good news about this speculative failure is that the current F9v1.1 on the pad in Florida probably wouldn't have these new actuators on it.  So if this is what caused the problem, it's less likely to affect next week's launch of AsiaSat-6.
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Offline Asmegin

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FTS saves the day :D

Looked like it was beyond horizontal there for a few seconds...

Offline cro-magnon gramps

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According to the individual who shot the video, the fire trucks were responding in droves by the time his video went out.  He's a local - contacted us just before checking his cattle lol.
Not sure, as a former farmer, if he had his priorities right, but appreciate the thought... of course don't want any vacancies in the SpaceX Cheer Leading line up either :(
Gramps "Earthling by Birth, Martian by the grace of The Elon." ~ "Hate, it has caused a lot of problems in the world, but it has not solved one yet." Maya Angelou ~ Tony Benn: "Hope is the fuel of progress and fear is the prison in which you put yourself."

Online ugordan

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Video of flight and explosion http://www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/Rocket-Explodes-at-Space-X-272370541.html

Two videos, actually, now. The 2nd one is much better. Looks like the vehicle started veering out of control before the engine shut down and FTS was activated.

SpaceX said in a statement that FTS was triggered:
Quote
Earlier today, in McGregor, Texas, SpaceX conducted a test flight of a three engine version of the F9R test vehicle (successor to Grasshopper). During the flight, an anomaly was detected in the vehicle and the flight termination system automatically terminated the mission.

Throughout the test and subsequent flight termination, the vehicle remained in the designated flight area. There were no injuries or near injuries. An FAA representative was present at all times. 

With research and development projects, detecting vehicle anomalies during the testing is the purpose of the program. Today’s test was particularly complex,  pushing the limits of the vehicle further than any previous test.  As is our practice, the company will be reviewing the flight record details to learn more about the performance of the vehicle prior to our next test.

SpaceX will provide another update when the flight data has been fully analyzed.

From: http://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-explode-2014-8#ixzz3BAcrJ3JL
« Last Edit: 08/23/2014 12:28 am by ugordan »

Offline jimvela

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That looks like a range destruct to me...  Loose control, blow it up...

Offline Chris Bergin

Looked like it was doing a Proton for a bit there.
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Offline Chris Bergin

Blew herself up....

Elon:

>Three engine F9R Dev1 vehicle auto-terminated during test flight. No injuries or near injuries. Rockets are tricky …<
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Offline Chris Bergin

SpaceX statement:

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Offline NovaSilisko

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Looks to me like the legs were folded up, not sure given the resolution of the video.

Offline cscott

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"Three engine version of the F9R" --- I wonder if this was actually F9R-Dev2?  Perhaps it was being given a spin in Texas before travelling out to New Mexico?  Previous flights were all single-engine, right?

EDIT: Elon's tweet clearly states this was the F9R-Dev1.  So... no.
« Last Edit: 08/23/2014 01:53 am by cscott »

Offline Chris Bergin

Farewell F9R Dev1, and we thank you.
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Offline robertross

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Video of flight and explosion http://www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/Rocket-Explodes-at-Space-X-272370541.html

wow, incredible.

It looks to me that she was squirrley most of the way up; almost as if the rocket was desperately trying to correct itself constantly.

Thoughts?

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