SpaceX Falcon 9 : Spaceflight SSO-A : December 3, 2018 - DISCUSSION

[gongora]

Interesting factoid from Eric Berger:

SpaceX has now landed half of the rockets (first stages) they have launched.

https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1069663195311280128

It's SpaceX's 65th Falcon 9 launch. It's only 64 if you don't count Falcon Heavy, and 32 landings counts both side cores from the Heavy.

It's the 64th Falcon 9 launch.

[whitelancer64]

Interesting factoid from Eric Berger:

SpaceX has now landed half of the rockets (first stages) they have launched.

https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1069663195311280128

It's SpaceX's 65th Falcon 9 launch. It's only 64 if you don't count Falcon Heavy, and 32 landings counts both side cores from the Heavy.

It's the 64th Falcon 9 launch.

If you don't count the Heavy then there are only 30 landings.

[Johnnyhinbos]

From the press release. SeaHawk 1 and Capella 1 are in orbit.

http://spaceflight.com/spaceflight-successfully-launches-64-satellites-on-first-dedicated-rideshare-mission/

"One research payload includes the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s cubesat, SeaHawk-1 carrying the HawkEye Ocean Color Imager. UNCW has been funded by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and NASA serves in an advisory capacity to ensure the maximum scientific utility of the science data. NASA’s Science Mission Directorate and UNCW have created a partnership to expand accessibility to the data."

“This launch was an impressive undertaking and an important milestone for the smallsat industry as well as for many of the organizations involved,” said Payam Banazadeh, founder and CEO of Capella Space Corporation. “Capella’s first satellite is now on orbit and we are one step closer to our goal of providing timely, reliable, and frequent information using Synthetic Aperture Radar technology.”

Steven,

Would you be able to update your SSO-A satellite list with the know status of those who’ve checked in?

[Steven Pietrobon]

Would you be able to update your SSO-A satellite list with the know status of those who’ve checked in?

I already had been doing that with the list on my computer. I've gone back and updated the list on NSF to show which satellites have been confirmed to be in orbit. Still waiting for quite a few confirmations!

[deruch]

https://twitter.com/StephenClark1/status/1069699371783073800

Hamilton-1 was also questionable based on FCC permits.

I am pretty sure Hamilton-1 was not aboard based on that. Also SpaceICE, for which the permit also never got approved, was also omitted from the most recent update to the ELaNa schedule. I re-added Al-Farabi-2 to my list a couple days ago, and with the removal of ROSE-1 I now count 65 spacecraft, so we just need one more confirmed absence?

This is just a guess, but maybe KazSciSat-1?  SSTL announced that KazSTSat was successful and in their press release talked about their partnership with the Kazakh JV (Ghalam) on the satellite.  The same JV was responsible for the 3U KazSciSat-1 but it didn't get a mention in the PR.  Even if SSTL wasn't involved with the cubesat, I would kinda expect them to call out that Ghalam was also launching another sat on the same mission.  But I admit that is very, very tenuous grounds for my WAG.

[strawwalker]

I now count 65 spacecraft, so we just need one more confirmed absence?

This is just a guess, but maybe KazSciSat-1?  SSTL announced that KazSTSat was successful and in their press release talked about their partnership with the Kazakh JV (Ghalam) on the satellite.  The same JV was responsible for the 3U KazSciSat-1 but it didn't get a mention in the PR.  Even if SSTL wasn't involved with the cubesat, I would kinda expect them to call out that Ghalam was also launching another sat on the same mission.  But I admit that is very, very tenuous grounds for my WAG.

I noticed that omission as well, but like you say, maybe SSTL wasn't involved with the cubesat. I've been treating KazSciSat-1 as confirmed ever since it was mentioned by name by the Kazakh Ministry of Defense and Aerospace Industry spokesperson in an Interfax blurb last month. Also, I noticed this article today from KazInform which mentions a 5 kg Kazakh cubesat on this flight studying the ionosphere. I'm 99% sure that is KazSciSat-1, not Al-Farabi 2. The wording is a little vague on whether SSTL is involved in that one.

[testflight01]

If there are amateur radio operators interested in listening to Al-Farabi 2, here is some info that can help (I think that launch-related info is outdated in this post):
https://www.facebook.com/aarsk.kz/posts/2237558283232642

Quoted are the contents of the post (as of Dec 4, 2018 @11am GMT+6):

Scientific-technological park of the Kazakh national university named after Al-Farabi (Almaty) in cooperation with the Association of the Amateur Radio Services of Kazakhstan invite all the radio amateurs of Kazakhstan and of other countries to take part in searching and receiving of the «AL-FARABI-2» nanosatellite signals due to be launched into the orbit on November 29, 2018 at 00:32 of Astana time.
The satellite was constructed through efforts of the university students with the purpose to conduct the scientific experiments in speace. The launch is dedicated to celebration of the Day of the 1st President of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

The satellite will transmit the CW signals with the “AF-2” message every 3 minutes.
Satellite data:

Callsign: UN1GWA
Frequency: 436,5 MHz
Modulation: CW.
Output power: 1 W.
Antenna: non-directional
Telemetry frequency: 436,5 MHz
Telemetry modulation: GMSK-4800
Initial orbital data:
UTC time at liftoff: 323:18:31:47.990
UTC time of current state: 323:19:14:59.490
Mission elapsed time (s): +2591.50
ECEF (X,Y,Z) Position (m): +299136.050, +1606142.483, -6757861.349
ECEF (X,Y,Z) Velocity* (m/s): +5500.939, +5093.215, +1454.386
LVLH to BODY quaternion (S,X,Y,Z): +0.0064870, -0.9999740, -0.0007769, -0.0030674
Inertial body rates (X,Y,Z) (deg/s): +0.1688750, +0.0721098, -0.0220705
Apogee Altitude** (km): +574.414
Perigee Altitude** (km): +558.083
Inclination (deg): +97.775
Argument of Perigee (deg): +98.797
Longitude of the Asc. Node*** (deg): +45.066
True Anomaly (deg): +182.386
* ECEF velocity is Earth relative
** Apogee/Perigee altitude assumes a spherical Earth, 6378.137 km radius
*** LAN is defined as the angle between Greenwich Meridian (Earth longitude 0)
and the ascending node
**** All orbital elements are defined as osculating at the instant of the printed state. Orbital elements are computed in an inertial frame realized by inertially freezing the WGS84 ECEF frame at time of current state.

90 minutes before the lanuch the new orbital data will be provided.

First 10 radioamateurs which will receive the satellite signals and will send the confirmation of their reception at the email address stated below will receive a memorial plaque free of charge. Email: [email protected]

Email subject must contain the following text: al-farabi-2. It's advised that email should only contain the link to the video made and posted on the YouTube or similar video hosting.

Email must contain the name and surname of the radio amateur, his/her callsign (if available), reception time/date, QTH-locator of the station used to receive the signals as well as brief information about the receiver and antenna used. All radio amateurs who will send their signal reception confirmation will receive memorial diplomas issued in the electronic format.

[AUricle]

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1069679948103847939

So....why build giant nets on boats and practice catching them then?

I'm wondering if they are getting close to giving up on dry recovery and just figuring out how to safely just do wet recovery and refurbishment.

Exactly. I think they're finding it IS possible to land them and just pick them up. Now, that pre-supposes a good weather perfectly soft landing that puts NO saltwater into the interior of the fairing half.
What about this? Fit each halve with an airbag that deploys just prior to landing, which effectively seals the interior from any intrusion of saltwater spray or.......

[ugordan]

Look how much whiter the LOX tank looks at around 1 min in flight compared to the pad shot. I wonder whether it's an optical effect of looking at a thin sheet of snow/ice from a more oblique angle or it really does ice-over fast once it actually gets going and much more air is streaming along the skin.

Yes, it's pretty much the opposite sides of the vehicle shown, but the air was blowing into the side that was visible on the pad shot.

[JimO]

Any word on the time/place of the second stage deorbit burn?

[mgeagon]

Hans said the close proximity of Mr. Steven to the landing fairings allows the team to verify the condition of the halves. So, even though the ship isn’t catching the falling pieces, it is essential in certifying their reuse ability. In a senario where SpaceX ends up using salt water exposed fairings, it may well be that the effort to outfit Mr. Steven was well worth the cost.

[deruch]

Wow, following all the payload announcements of live sats is so much fun!  Outstanding job on integrating by Spaceflight.

[TrevorMonty]

Wow, following all the payload announcements of live sats is so much fun!  Outstanding job on integrating by Spaceflight.

Their 1st and maybe last of these missions using LV like F9. Recent comment from Spaceflight spokesman said organising 60 different payloads was bit of headache. They are looking to use the new small LVs like Electron in future.

[deruch]

Wow, following all the payload announcements of live sats is so much fun!  Outstanding job on integrating by Spaceflight.

Their 1st and maybe last of these missions using LV like F9. Recent comment from Spaceflight spokesman said organising 60 different payloads was bit of headache. They are looking to use the new small LVs like Electron in future.

Yeah, that's why no one does it.  Hopefully some future FCC and FAA streamlining for such group launches can ease some of the regulatory burden.  But herding cats is never going to be simple.

[gongora]

https://twitter.com/Audacy/status/1070569693348413441

Mission Update (Launch + 48 hours): Our team continues to work on making contact with Audacy Zero. This shows the train of some of the 64 satellites launched by the SSO-A mission. Blue objects are those we've attempted to make contact with and orange, our best guess of the rest.

[SciNews]

Wired: "The Spacex 'Clown Car' Launch Actually Worked—Here's How" https://www.wired.com/story/the-spacex-clown-car-launch-actually-workedheres-how/

[Alexphysics]

Clearly SpaceX still have work to do on leg retraction:

https://twitter.com/w00ki33/status/1071462774834790405

Legs are being removed from B1046.3 at port of LA. #spacex @Teslarati

Edit to add:

Beautiful shots

https://twitter.com/w00ki33/status/1071463546494451712

First grid fin has been removed from the 3x flown Falcon 9 standing at port of LA. Been wanting to see this happen for years. So NEAT! #spacex @Teslarati

The transporter they have to use at Port of LA is the one to move boosters across the country. That one has the lower ring tightly enclosed around the booster and the upper ring goes right where the grid fins are so they cannot load boosters with legs or grid fins (and hence why they're removing everything). The transporter at the cape does not have this problem since the lower ring is not tightly enclosing the booster so it has some space for the legs and the upper ring is more towards the end of the interstage so the booster can keep its expensive gird fins.

[rpapo]

...so the booster can keep its expensive gird fins.

In this case, more than expensive to make, simply time consuming to remove and reinstall.

[1]

Edit: moved from updates.

Wow (bold mine).

From SpaceFlight:

The most common question that I have received since launch has been “How did it go?”.  The short answer is 100% mission success since our system did everything it was designed to do.  The next question is “How are the customers doing?”. Overall they seem to be doing extremely well.  One customer was not deployed, as expected, because we sealed them inside their dispenser when they could not demonstrate adequate licensing.  We strongly suspect that a second spacecraft did not fully deploy from their customer-provided dispenser, which is still under investigation. Currently all but six spacecraft have been contacted by their owners and we hope that the organizations still working to contact their spacecraft have success in the next few days as all objects are positively identified and labeled by CSpOC.

https://www.spaceflightindustries.com/2018/12/20/sso-a-smallsat-express-wrap-up/

Looks like they took lessons learned from the Swarm Technologies fiasco quite seriously. Good for them.

[Skyrocket]

From SpaceFlight:

One customer was not deployed, as expected, because we sealed them inside their dispenser when they could not demonstrate adequate licensing.

Which one was this? I heard some unconfirmed rumors, that it might be ENOCH, but no solid confirmation.

From SpaceFlight:

We strongly suspect that a second spacecraft did not fully deploy from their customer-provided dispenser, which is still under investigation.

Again, which one was this?