Spacex did a bit Progress in the next flight test in the world of the most powerful rocket on Tuesday, finally overcoming technical problems that harassed the two previous premieres of the program.
But minutes after the mission, the spacecraft lost control when he drove into space, and then returned to the atmosphere somewhere over the Indian Ocean almost an hour after starting with Starbase in Texas, a private space port of the company near the American-Meticus border.
The novel generation SpaceX rocket has been designed to finally pay the load and private and government crews between Earth, Moon and Mars. The rocket is sophisticated and enormous, wider and longer than Jumbo Jet Boeing 747, and after almost two years of constant progress from the first test flight in 2023. It was a year of failure for a spacecraft.
During the previous two test flights – everyone uses the modernized “Block 2 Starship Design”. During both flights, the vehicle got out of control and fell apart, spreading debris in the area near the Bahams, Turks and Caicos.
The good news is that this did not happen on Tuesday. The main engines of the ship fired throughout the duration, putting the vehicle on the expected trajectory towards splash in the Indian Ocean. For a miniature time, it seemed that the ship was on a good way to a successful flight.
“Starrat reached the planned cut off of the ship’s engine, so a great improvement compared to the last flight! In addition, there is no significant loss of thermal tiles while climbing” wrote Elon MuskFounder and CEO of SpaceX, on X.
The bad news is that Tuesday’s test flight revealed more problems, preventing Spacex from achieving the most essential goals outlined by Musk.
“Udiska caused the loss of the main pressure of the tank during the coast phase and re -entry”, musk published on the X. “Flight of good data for review”.
Along with the loss of pressure in the tank, the rocket slowly began to spin when she moved over 100 miles above the ground through the black. This loss of control meant another premature end of the ship’s flight. The most noteworthy among the unmet flight goals was the desire to SpaceX to examine the performance of the ship’s thermal shield, which includes improved heat protection tiles to better withstand balmy temperatures replay in the atmosphere.
“The most important thing is data on the improvement of tile structure, so these are essentially data during the high heating phase, re -entering in order to improve the tiles to the next iteration – Musk – Musk Ars Technica said Before Tuesday’s flight. “So we have a dozen or more experiments with tiles. We try different coatings on the tiles. We try different manufacturing techniques, different attachment techniques. We change the tile gap again.
Engineers are hungry for changes in the thermal shield changes that cannot be fully tested on the ground. SpaceX officials hope that novel tiles will be more solid than those that fly on the first generation, or Block 1 versions of the ship, enabling future ships to land and quickly launch, without the need for time -consuming inspections, renovation, and in some cases replacement of tile. This is the basic principle of Starship Spacex plans, which include the supply of astronauts to the surface of the moon, disseminating the low earth orbit with tanker tankers, and ultimately helping to establish a settlement on Mars, all of which are based on the quick utilize of a spaceship and its super weighty amplifier.