I’ve gathered here recent news and updates on reusable rocket powered vehicles in operation and in development. Check out previous roundups:<\/p>\n
Rocket reusability will lead to space transports with aircraft-like operation. That is, orbital flight and return followed by rapid reflight with minimal preparation. Vehicles should fly thousands of times with only occasional refurbishment and, most importantly, spacefare should fall to levels similar to long distance airfare.<\/span><\/p>\n Reusable rocket powered vehicle designs fall roughly into the following five categories:<\/span><\/p>\n Below are reports on several projects and programs that fall into at least one of these categories.<\/p>\n ** SpaceX Starship<\/strong><\/a> –\u00a0 Third test flight shows major progress —- The third orbital test flight (OFT-3) <\/strong>successfully demonstrated several key Starship capabilities<\/em> On March 14th, SpaceX flew a Starship for the third time. The flight test fulfilled a number of goals beyond those accomplished in the previous two flights. See this SpaceX overview: Starship’s Third Flight Test | SpaceX – Mar.14.2024<\/a><\/p>\n OFT-3 highlights:<\/p>\n During the coast phase in orbit, two important tests were carried out:<\/p>\n —- FAA suspends Starship license until an investigation<\/strong> into the problems of this flight is completed. This happens automatically if there is any variation from the approved flight plan significant enough to be classified as a mishap:<\/p>\n The mishap investigation should not significantly increase the time to the launch of the fourth Starship since both stages achieved their primary goals and the problems were not as serious as for the first two test flights. SpaceX will actually do the investigating and the FAA will then evaluate the results. If they are deemed satisfactory, the FAA issues a statement about the completion of the investigation and sometime after that they issue a modification to the current launch license that approves another flight.<\/p>\n It should be pointed out that the Starship is basically operational now as an expendable launch vehicle. The boosters functioned properly through stage separation and the second stage on OFT-3 would have reached a full orbit with just a brief extension of the firing of the Raptors. Reusability, however, is key to SpaceX’s plans for the vehicle and it won’t be declared operational until the booster does a soft landing and the Starship stage survives reentry and makes a soft landing as well.<\/p>\n —- SpaceX expects to be ready for 4th test flight by early May<\/strong>: SpaceX planning rapid turnaround for next Starship flight | SpaceNews – Mar.19.2024<\/a><\/p>\n Speaking at the Satellite 2024 conference March 19, Gwynne Shotwell, president and chief operating officer of SpaceX, said the company was still reviewing the data from the vehicle\u2019s third integrated launch March 14 but expected to be ready to fly again soon.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re still going through the data\u201d from the flight, she said when asked about the analysis of data from the mission. \u201cIt was an incredibly successful flight. We hit exactly where we wanted to go.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n …<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll figure out what happened on both stages,\u201d she said, not discussing what may have gone wrong with either, \u201cand get back to flight hopefully in about six weeks,\u201d or early May.<\/em><\/p>\n Shotwell doubted they would launch any Starlink satellites during the mission.<\/p>\n Speaking at the Space Capitol III event by Payload March 18, Kelvin Coleman, FAA associate administrator for commercial space transportation, said he did not anticipate that investigation to turn up any major issues that could significantly delay the next launch.<\/em><\/p>\n The FAA also hopes to move soon to a license that covers multiples flights<\/p>\n … Coleman said the agency wants to move to a process where the license is valid for \u201cportfolio of launches\u201d rather than individual ones. That is particularly important, he added, because SpaceX is planning six to nine more Starship launches this year.<\/em><\/p>\n That is part of a broader effort to streamline the launch licensing process to address criticism from industry and Congress that the FAA is moving too slowly on approving launch licenses under a new set of regulations known as Part 450. … Preparations for the fourth test are underway: Following IFT-3 milestones, SpaceX prepares for fourth Starship flight | NASASpaceFlight.com – Mar.22.2024<\/a><\/p>\n SpaceX is preparing to follow up its third flight of Starship \u2013 one that achieved another leap forward with the world\u2019s largest rocket in history \u2013 with the IFT-4 mission. Potentially as early as May, the fourth flight is expected to pair Booster 11 with Ship 29, with the latter already back at the launch site for its Static Fire test campaign.<\/em><\/p>\n A static firing test of the 6 Raptor engines on Ship 29 took place on March 25th :<\/p>\n Full-duration static fire of all six Raptor engines on Flight 4 Starship pic.twitter.com\/HzS4SeaoEV<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 25, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n
\n
\n
\n<\/span><\/p>\n\n
\n
\n
\n<\/em><\/p>\n
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n\n
\n
\n
\n
\n<\/em><\/p>\n\n