SpaceX Falcon 9 : SAOCOM 1B : Cape Canaveral : August 30, 2020 (23:19 UTC)

[DaveJes1979]

It is a light payload, only going to sun-synchronous orbit.  Sounds like a good candidate for RTLS.

[gongora]

It is a light payload, only going to sun-synchronous orbit.  Sounds like a good candidate for RTLS.

The previous flight was RTLS.

[albatros68]

In 2020 CONAE´s budget Saocom launch is set for 2020 1st quarter
http://argentinaenelespacio.blogspot.com/2019/09/presupuesto-2020-de-3748-millones-para.html#more

[albatros68]

Also in the same page SARE is said to have been shelved for the last 4 years but will be budgeted a small amount next year to restart it. Thus it will not ride along SAOCOM 1b

[baldusi]

Josefina Peres, Alternate Chief of SAOCOM Project yesterday gave this presentation, where the launch campaign is stated as Jan2020/Feb2020 with the launch window Feb2020/Mar2020.

[Michael Baylor]

Notice that the slide in the above post says "Cape Canaveral." That is not an error. The launch site for this mission has been changed to the Cape.

https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1182025275573510146

[whitelancer64]

Notice that the slide in the above post says "Cape Canaveral." That is not an error. The launch site for this mission has been changed to the Cape.

https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1182025275573510146

The only reason I HATE this is I was planning to go to Vandy and see that launch.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/chrisg_nsf/status/1182029721623842819

For those asking for a visual of what a southward, doglegged polar launch trajectory out of Cape Canaveral will look like, here you go.

[vaporcobra]

Small heads up re: the last date of an East Coast (near) polar launch. Still more than half a century

That said, NASA apparently last used this corridor in 1965-66 to orbit TIROS satellites using Thor-Delta rockets.

More information here. TIROS 9 and 10 flew on Delta-C on 22 January 1965 and 2 July 1965, respectively. ESSA 1 also flew on Delta-C on 3 February 1966.

http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/thorflew.html

"Remarkably, Delta boosted the TIROS 9 and 10 and ESSA 1 weathersats into near sun synchronous orbits - from Cape Canaveral, Florida! The flight paths doglegged south, crossing Cuba and Panama before the third stage fired over the equator just northwest of South America to complete the insertion. (Delta would not fly from Vandenberg AFB until 1966.)"

[pospa]

Small heads up re: the last date of an East Coast (near) polar launch. Still more than half a century

That said, NASA apparently last used this corridor in 1965-66 to orbit TIROS satellites using Thor-Delta rockets.

More information here. TIROS 9 and 10 flew on Delta-C on 22 January 1965 and 2 July 1965, respectively. ESSA 1 also flew on Delta-C on 3 February 1966.

http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/thorflew.html

"Remarkably, Delta boosted the TIROS 9 and 10 and ESSA 1 weathersats into near sun synchronous orbits - from Cape Canaveral, Florida! The flight paths doglegged south, crossing Cuba and Panama before the third stage fired over the equator just northwest of South America to complete the insertion. (Delta would not fly from Vandenberg AFB until 1966.)"

Hmm, it looks like that last launch from CC to the polar orbit was in 1969.
So 50 not 60 years ago.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESSA-9

[ace5]

what was the reason for changing the launch site?

[Tommyboy]

what was the reason for changing the launch site?

Probably because now they don't have to de-mothball and re-mothball SLC4E, move the whole crew there and back, etc.

[rsdavis9]

what was the reason for changing the launch site?

Probably because now they don't have to de-mothball and re-mothball SLC4E, move the whole crew there and back, etc.

Also something about wildfires shutting down SLC4E for a while in california.

[jpo234]

what was the reason for changing the launch site?

Probably because now they don't have to de-mothball and re-mothball SLC4E, move the whole crew there and back, etc.

The fairing catchers are at the east coast. Might have something to do with the decision.

[DaveJes1979]

It is probably the case that SpaceX doesn't want to have to battle the seal pup issue if they can avoid it.  They wouldn't need the drone ships assuming they were going to do RTLS, so I don't think that is the issue.

The dog-leg trajectory is quite a delta V penalty.  Maybe the payload is light enough that it doesn't matter.  Or maybe this forces a switch to drone ship landing...might be complicated with Cuba in the way.

This doesn't portend well for future Vandenberg launches.  The manifest was rather thin to begin with.  And they didn't even bother to retrofit the pad to be Falcon Heavy-capable.  Too bad for us west-coast launch fans.

[ZachS09]

Is SpaceX gonna do all polar-orbit missions from the Cape starting with SAOCOM 1B?

[Lars-J]

Is SpaceX gonna do all polar-orbit missions from the Cape starting with SAOCOM 1B?

As many as they can. (not all payloads are this light) It could also be a demonstration one-off to prove they can.

[OccasionalTraveller]

Is SpaceX gonna do all polar-orbit missions from the Cape starting with SAOCOM 1B?

As many as they can. (not all payloads are this light) It could also be a demonstration one-off to prove they can.

If the payload is too heavy for F9 to do a dog-leg, it still may be cheaper for SpaceX overall to launch on Falcon Heavy from Florida than to maintain a launch presence in Vandenberg. Up to SpaceX whether they want to charge the customer more or just eat the cost difference themselves!

Positioning of the ASDS could be a problem though. If you go south after passing Fort Lauderdale on the initial coast-hugging trajectory, for a total of 1200km from the launch site (which was the distance for STP-2), you end up roughly between the Cayman Islands and Jamaica, having overflown Cuba. Depends how much of the dogleg is performed by the boosters and centre core, and how much by the second stage! If the centre core stays on the same azimuth and goes 1200km it's landing somewhere between Cuba, Jamaica and Haiti. (Have to allow a little for rotation of the Earth while the core is in the air.)

Perhaps I begin to see why the drone ship was positioned so far out for STP-2.

[pb2000]

Raul's SpaceX map shows downrange distance of 807-860km for expended boosters so if the second stage did the dogleg and the trajectory was right on the west corner of the Bahamas, it would leave just enough room for a failed boost-back burn. With the grid fins and RCS, it could probably still do a bit of maneuvering, to further push out to sea (and Cuba's territorial waters).

[Lars-J]

I polar corridor FH flight will be very tricky, where would they recover the FH core? They go pretty far down-range. A drone ship parked right off the coast of Cuba? :-) No, I’m not sure it is practical to use FH for this.