Astra launch failure caused by one of five 1st stage engines shutting down at liftoff
Capitalism in space: According to an Astra press release, its launch failure on August 28th was caused when one of the rocket’s five 1st stage engines shut down one second after liftoff.
One of the five main engines shut down less than one second after liftoff, causing the vehicle to slowly lift off the pad before resuming its trajectory. After approximately two minutes and thirty seconds of flight, the range issued an all engine-shutdown command, ending the flight.
The lack of one engine explains the rocket’s strange take-off, where it initially tilted slightly, shifted sideways, and then straightened up and began rising upward. From that point onward the ground controllers knew the mission would not reach orbit, and were only waiting until it reached a safe altitude to cut off the engines and have the rocket fall into the ocean safely.
While the launch failed, Astra’s engineers should be very satisfied by how the software on the rocket functioned. Rather than shut everything down and crashing into the launchpad fully fueled where it could do a lot of damage, the rocket immediately compensated for the loss of one engine and resumed a stable flight, allowing it to get clear.
This success does not negate the failure however. Astra needs to find out why one engine shut down.
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Capitalism in space: According to an Astra press release, its launch failure on August 28th was caused when one of the rocket’s five 1st stage engines shut down one second after liftoff.
One of the five main engines shut down less than one second after liftoff, causing the vehicle to slowly lift off the pad before resuming its trajectory. After approximately two minutes and thirty seconds of flight, the range issued an all engine-shutdown command, ending the flight.
The lack of one engine explains the rocket’s strange take-off, where it initially tilted slightly, shifted sideways, and then straightened up and began rising upward. From that point onward the ground controllers knew the mission would not reach orbit, and were only waiting until it reached a safe altitude to cut off the engines and have the rocket fall into the ocean safely.
While the launch failed, Astra’s engineers should be very satisfied by how the software on the rocket functioned. Rather than shut everything down and crashing into the launchpad fully fueled where it could do a lot of damage, the rocket immediately compensated for the loss of one engine and resumed a stable flight, allowing it to get clear.
This success does not negate the failure however. Astra needs to find out why one engine shut down.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
While the launch failed, Astra’s engineers should be very satisfied by how the software on the rocket functioned.
And their flight controllers should be very satisfied in how they handled the malfunction, with an apparent absence of panic and a focus on assuring a safe flight termination in the face of the unexpected.
Steely-eyed missile men …
whoever left the gate open ought to get a pat on the back
I seem to be playing the dog-in-the-manger with respect to Astra’s recent problems. But I can’t get past the fact that their business model emphasizes a core team centrally located away from the launch site, and what that may say about the results of the last two launch attempts.
The first attempt shut down because the launch abort system (correctly?) detected an engine startup problem. Someone decided something had to be adjusted, but apparently that something was NOT an engine, but an “operational” procedure. Was there anyone on-site who could inspect the engines? There didn’t seem to be a long enough time between launch attempts to inspect much less swap out one or more engines. Did they settle for dialing back the safety tolerances, and it bit them?
I’ll bet the USSF is glad their payload was only a chunk of concrete!
Scott Manley
The Astra Launch
August 29, 2021
https://youtu.be/x2jU5W4ehPE
11:41
If I could have somehow survived the thermal and acoustic environment-and gripped the lower edge and lifted it with the LV’s thrust-to-weight at unity….could I have done a Superman and got it going with a push?
Jeff–
Here ya’ go…
The Kinks
“(Wish I Could Fly Like) Superman” (1980)
https://youtu.be/Nvsbk4P3NQ0
6:28
It was the rooskies….
Y’know like how American astronauts must have drilled the hole in the russian module of ISS.