FAILURE: Firefly Alpha 1st flight - Vandenberg SLC-2W - 3 Sep 2021 (01:59 UTC)

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/thejackbeyer/status/1433698123013001216

Firefly Aerospace's Alpha rocket suffered an in-flight anomaly on its debut launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Here's a full video replay from myself and Michael Baylor (@nextspaceflight) for @NASASpaceflight.

➡️

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/wanzong/status/1433637810943135749

My friend lives in Orcutt, CA and said 30
minutes after the anomaly pieces were coming down all over their neighborhood!

https://twitter.com/wxmeddler/status/1433661444403384322

It's not that the rocket wasn't going downrange over water, it certainly was. The issue was these light carbon fiber materials were carried by winds blowing to the NE back over land.

[ugordan]

Already 25 seconds into that video something appears to abruptly change in the engine exhaust plume, the wide shot shows it getting smaller and the zoomed in shot shows a puff of flames.

I'm guessing they had an engine out which would explain the late max q and loss of control authority.
From that point on you can tell the vehicle axis and the exhaust plume are not 100% aligned indicating the remaining engines have gimballed a bit to redirect the remaining combined thrust vector through the CoG.

[jacqmans]

CAUTION URGED DUE TO POSSIBLE DEBRIS FROM TERMINATED LAUNCH
Space Launch Delta 30 Public Affairs / Published September 02, 2021

VANDENBERG SPACE FORCE BASE, Calif. --

Space Launch Delta 30 terminated the Firefly Aerospace Inc., Alpha rocket over the Pacific Ocean on Sept. 2.

As a result there may be debris in the local area.

A team of investigators has determined that any debris from the rocket should be considered unsafe.

All recreational facilities, including beaches on-base that were closed for the launch will remain closed until further notice due to the ongoing investigation.

If you see or suspect debris in your area, please stay at least 50 feet away and report any findings to the Firefly Aerospace Inc. hotline at 805-605-2734.

https://www.vandenberg.spaceforce.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/2763859/caution-urged-due-to-possible-debris-from-terminated-launch/

[woods170]

Unconfirmed source report:


- Vehicle was slow getting off the pad
- Vehicle underperformance from pad release to end of flight.
- Performance issue on multiple engines
- Vehicle was nowhere near the required altitude at end of flight
- Vehicle terminated by FTS
- Even if stage 1 had completed powered flight the mission would have ended in failure due to vehicle not having reached required altitude and velocity for stage 1 burnout and separation.


As my source put it: this flight was doomed the second the pad released the vehicle.

[Yiosie]

[Questions]

Everyday Astronaut's stream IS the official stream.

https://twitter.com/erdayastronaut/status/1431377106471161859

[electricdawn]

Off-Topic: Tim Dodd is doing a very good job in educating and interesting lay-people in space-flight. Maybe not everybody likes the way he comes across (I like it, he seems very natural and genuinely excited about what he presents), but even if you don't... just turn down the volume, k?

Edit: Words are hard.

[ugordan]

Slightly different angle + footage of a couple of lightweight-ish-looking pieces falling fairly close to the observers:

[sghill]

I'm sad for Firefly, but the fact that the booster held together after pirouetting out of control at supersonic speeds until it was finally FTS'd speaks volumes about the strength and resilience of the system.

They'll get it right.

[Fireworking]

Already 25 seconds into that video something appears to abruptly change in the engine exhaust plume, the wide shot shows it getting smaller and the zoomed in shot shows a puff of flames.

I'm guessing they had an engine out which would explain the late max q and loss of control authority.
From that point on you can tell the vehicle axis and the exhaust plume are not 100% aligned indicating the remaining engines have gimballed a bit to redirect the remaining combined thrust vector through the CoG.

You can also see that in Jack's view the rocket immediately starts sliding to the right. Like the gimbal could keep the rocket upright but not going straight. But, then what caused the anomaly? Were the aero forces too powerful for the engines to gimbal for?

[Alberto-Girardi]

I fell more worried more for the underperforming than for the final explosion. Many first launches resulted in an explosion, but generally the vehicle performed good before that. Do you think that my imression is correct?

[cuddihy]

Tim Dodd mentioned they have an odd gimbaling system in only 1 axis per engine, so it's going to have unstable dynamics issues when an engine goes out.

Amazing execution by their team to get that far with underperforming engines off the pad! It goes to show the hardest part of commercial spaceflight development (as Musk has said -- with the caveat of production/factory being harder) is getting engine reliability up and per unit cost down to the point where your engines basically aren't failing but their manufacture isn't bankrupting your effort!

Build more engines, test the snot out of them, etc.

[edkyle99]

Already 25 seconds into that video something appears to abruptly change in the engine exhaust plume, the wide shot shows it getting smaller and the zoomed in shot shows a puff of flames.

Agreed.  Not only that, but the rate of acceleration seems to fall beginning at that point.

I'm guessing they had an engine out which would explain the late max q and loss of control authority.
From that point on you can tell the vehicle axis and the exhaust plume are not 100% aligned indicating the remaining engines have gimballed a bit to redirect the remaining combined thrust vector through the CoG.

Supporting that idea is that 3/4th of the nominal liftoff thrust is about equal to the GLOW of the vehicle, so it would slow down if an engine was lost 10 or 15 seconds into flight, but would, just, have positive thrust-to-weight.  Impressive to see it remain under control under those conditions.  Obviously didn't have enough control authority left to make it through Max-Q.

Falcon 1, Astra Rocket, LauncherOne, Firefly Alpha.  All small LOX/kerosene rockets that have suffered propulsion failures during their early flights.  Two of those went on to achieve success.  The other two are still trying and may get there, but for now these four together only have 4 success in 12 launches.

 - Ed Kyle

[FutureSpaceTourist]

twitter.com/djsnm/status/1433816196231491590

Here's another angle that shows the fairing and payloads being torn off during the first turn. So if you built a satellite for this it didn't die in fire, it just fell to earth.

Edit to add:

https://twitter.com/djsnm/status/1433820239335079941

From the same video - this looks like a tank section based on the design, but it's curved the wrong way, probably a result of the FTS

[illectro]

Tim Dodd mentioned they have an odd gimbaling system in only 1 axis per engine, so it's going to have unstable dynamics issues when an engine goes out.

That's not really an odd system, it's quite common on rockets with 4 engines to use single axis gimballing.

It does lead to reduced control authority, and if the control system doesn't account for the missing engine then it'll induce rolls that need correction. Ultimately missing an engine means extra torques & reduced control so when going transonic that'll be a worst case situation.

[TrevorMonty]

Tim Dodd mentioned they have an odd gimbaling system in only 1 axis per engine, so it's going to have unstable dynamics issues when an engine goes out.

That's not really an odd system, it's quite common on rockets with 4 engines to use single axis gimballing.

It does lead to reduced control authority, and if the control system doesn't account for the missing engine then it'll induce rolls that need correction. Ultimately missing an engine means extra torques & reduced control so when going transonic that'll be a worst case situation.

Lose 1 out of 4 engines and its not making orbit so doesn't really matter if it loses control.

Sent from my SM-G570Y using Tapatalk

[TrevorMonty]

Loren's article from few years ago has comeback to light after Alpha's failure.

https://www.theverge.com/2015/6/29/8863121/spacex-falcon-9-rocket-explosion-excuses?utm_campaign=lorengrush&utm_content=chorus&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter

The reason space especially LVs is hard is that faults typically result in mission failure. Faults occur all the time in testing of earlier prototypes of other forms of transport but very rarely result in vehicle destruction. With land and sea vehicle we just turn engine off and stop. Aircraft less forgiving but allow flight envelope to be expanded up over dozens of flights. We don't expect a aircrafts maiden flight to be across Alantic but that is case with most LVs.

In case of SLS +Orion 2nd launch will be crew mission around moon. Any volunteers for cheap transAlantic flight on a new aeroplane's 2nd flight.


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[hartspace]

https://twitter.com/wanzong/status/1433637810943135749

My friend lives in Orcutt, CA and said 30
minutes after the anomaly pieces were coming down all over their neighborhood!

https://twitter.com/wxmeddler/status/1433661444403384322

It's not that the rocket wasn't going downrange over water, it certainly was. The issue was these light carbon fiber materials were carried by winds blowing to the NE back over land.

They may need to reassess the range launch criteria if debris is falling that far away.  Orcutt is more than 10 miles from SLC-2 and the rocket was even further downrange.  Wind direction and speed for a possible debris cloud used to be part of the range launch criteria as I recall it.

[illectro]

Lose 1 out of 4 engines and its not making orbit so doesn't really matter if it loses control.

Sent from my SM-G570Y using Tapatalk

Yeah at that point the main hope is to get as far away from launch site so it won’t be a danger, burn as much fuel as possible.

[Navier–Stokes]