Not according to the company, which took to social media platform X, owned by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, to rebut a report published Monday.

Sources within the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) and the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) shared with CNBC previously unreported notices and investigative records, which allege that SpaceX violated several clean water regulations. The company employs a water deluge system, common at launchpads such as Florida’s Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, to absorb heat and vibrations from firing rocket engines.

But according to CNBC, the firm’s use of that system this year—including during the third orbital test flight of Starship, the most powerful rocket ever built, and the Super Heavy booster—may be discharging industrial wastewater without TCEQ or EPA permission.

SpaceX swiftly refuted the CNBC report in a lengthy post on X, characterizing the story as “factually inaccurate.”

According to the company, the water deluge system uses potable, or drinking, water and has been authorized for operation by both the TCEQ and EPA, which filed their notices one week and five months ago, respectively.

“Throughout our ongoing coordination with both TCEQ and the EPA, we have explicitly asked if operation of the deluge system needed to stop and we were informed that operations could continue,” SpaceX said.

Neither agency immediately responded to FLYING’s request for comment.

Typically, a launch provider must be compliant with state and federal laws to obtain launch permissions from the FAA. On Monday, the aviation regulator postponed several meetings intended for stakeholders to provide feedback on SpaceX’s proposal to launch Starship from Starbase as many as 25 times per year. The agency did not provide a reason for the postponements.

“The FAA apologizes for any inconvenience,” it said. “Public meetings will be rescheduled; however, the docket remains open to receive public comments.”

Conflicting Accounts

Interestingly, CNBC and SpaceX cite the same sources to make their respective claims, raising questions about whether one party received bad information.

Starbase’s deluge system was installed after Starship’s maiden flight in April 2023, the impact of which sent debris flying miles away, led to an FAA investigation, and brought a lawsuit against the agency and SpaceX from five environmental groups. It was first tested in July with TCEQ personnel onsite, SpaceX said.

But regulators told CNBC the firm skipped a crucial step in the permitting process related to wastewater management. In its notice to SpaceX, TCEQ said it received 14 complaints claiming that the deluge system was harming the surrounding environment, including one last August alleging that Starbase was discharging industrial wastewater without a permit. 

Last month, a TCEQ investigation found that SpaceX did so four times between March and July. According to a SpaceX permit filing viewed by CNBC, some of that water contained concentrations of mercury that exceed water quality limits.

SpaceX on Monday, however, painted a very different picture. According to the company, no water samples tested were found to have mercury levels above EPA limits. It elaborated on Tuesday with another post claiming that the figures the outlet viewed were simply incorrect.

“While there may be a typo in one table of the initial TCEQ’s public version of the permit application, the rest of the application and the lab reports clearly states that levels of Mercury found in non-stormwater discharge associated with the water deluge system are well below state and federal water quality criteria,” the company said.

The firm flatly denied that any industrial wastewater is spewing from Starbase, claiming that the deluge system’s potable water is never used in or exposed to industrial processes.

It also said the landing pad is power washed prior to activating the system and that soil, air, and water samples are analyzed by an independent laboratory after each use. According to the company, most of the water is either vaporized by the heat of the engines or captured in special ponds, with only a tiny amount escaping the pad.

SpaceX further claimed it is well within its right to operate the system.

The EPA sent the company a formal notice of violation of the Clean Water Act the day before Starship’s third test flight in March. But according to the firm, the agency made a mistake.

“When the EPA issued their administrative order in March 2024, it was done without an understanding of basic facts of the deluge system’s operation or acknowledgement that we were operating under the Texas Multi-Sector General Permit,” SpaceX said.

Per the company’s version of events, the EPA agreed to allow it to continue using the system as it worked toward obtaining an individual permit from TCEQ, “because the deluge system has always complied with common conditions set by an individual permit, and causes no harm to the environment.”

It submitted a permit application on July 1 and said the agency is expected to issue a draft individual permit and agreed compliance order this week.

If SpaceX is ultimately found to be in violation of TCEQ and EPA rules, it could have a ripple effect on the Starship program, which is under pressure to meet obligations for NASA’s Artemis moon mission program as well as commercial customers.

According to the company, the rocket is ready to launch on its fifth test flight pending regulatory approval, but that may be difficult to obtain if it isn’t compliant with regulations. The firm will need to complete several more Starship test flights before the spacecraft is authorized for service missions.

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The post SpaceX Pushes Back on Rocket Launch Pollution Report appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

That’s not the beginning of a bad joke, but rather a description of SpaceX’s newly announced human spaceflight mission, which as soon as this year will send four astronauts to the ends of the Earth for the first time in history.

The company on Monday unveiled Fram2—a mission to explore the planet’s polar regions, over which no spacecraft has ever flown directly. During the three-to-five-day mission, which will launch from Florida atop SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, the crew will enter a 90-degree polar orbit and observe the Arctic and Antarctic wilderness through a cupola fitted to the company’s Dragon capsule.

No crewed spacecraft has ever reached an orbital path higher than 65 degrees, a feat the Soviet Vostok 6 mission, which carried the first woman to space, achieved in 1963. Typically, such orbits are occupied by smaller satellites, while larger spacecraft such as the International Space Station fly closer to the equator.

The expedition, named after the ship Fram used by Norwegian explorers to reach the poles in the late 19th century, will be Dragon’s sixth commercial astronaut mission and third free-flying mission. The spacecraft has flown three private missions to the ISS for customer Axiom Space, completed the Inspiration4 private orbital spaceflight on behalf of billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, and will launch another mission for Isaacman—Polaris Dawn—as soon as this month.

“Polaris Program, Inspiration4, Axiom, & now Fram2 showcase what commercial missions can achieve thanks to @SpaceX’s reusability and NASA’s vision with the commercial crew program,” Isaacman said in a post on social media platform X, which is owned by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. “All just small steps towards unlocking the last great frontier.”

Fram2 similarly is backed by a wealthy CEO, entrepreneur and adventurer Chun Wang, who made his fortune from Bitcoin mining. Wang purchased the mission for an undisclosed amount and will serve as commander.

According to his profile on X, Wang is an avid traveler who has visited half of the world’s countries and territories. But he has grander aspirations.

“I’ve read many sci-fi stories about the first human missions to Mars, usually led by NASA or some fictional government,” Wang said in a post on X. “Rarely does anyone dare to imagine such a mission may be carried out privately. But now, I increasingly believe that someday we will reach Mars—and it may be a person, or a company, not a nation, who gets there.”

Accompanying Wang will be commander Jannicke Mikkelsen of Norway, pilot Eric Philips of Australia, and mission specialist Rabea Rogge of Germany, who told the website Everyday Astronaut they befriended the blockchain entrepreneur on a trek to the North Pole. All four crew members will be making their first trip to the final frontier.

Mikkelson is a filmmaker who seeks out remote or hazardous filming locations and served as payload specialist on the 2019 One More Orbit mission—a record-breaking polar circumnavigation flight on the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11.

According to its website, Fram2 will shatter One More Orbit’s high water mark of 46 hours and 40 minutes, achieved in a Qatar Executive Gulfstream G650ER ultra-long-range business jet, by flying from the north to south pole in just 46 minutes.

Philips, a polar adventurer and guide, knows those regions well, having completed several ski expeditions. But viewing them from orbit has never been possible, even for astronauts on the ISS, to whom they appear invisible.

Fram2 will orbit at about 264-280 miles above Earth, allowing the crew to study strange green and purple light emissions known as Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancements (STEVE), atmospheric phenomena that resemble auroras. Researchers have yet to determine what causes the optical abnormalities. The mission will weigh input from space physicists and citizen scientists alike.

“Having spent much of my adult life in the polar regions this is an incredible opportunity to view the Arctic and Antarctica from space, in particular Antarctica which will be fully lit at this time of year,” said Philips.

Rogge similarly has a fascination with extreme environments, having researched ocean robotics in the Arctic in pursuit of ways to improve the technology. She will get the chance to study tools that could prepare humans for future missions to Mars and beyond, “from capturing the first human x-ray images in space to Just-in-Time training tools to the effects of spaceflight on behavioral health,” according to Fram2’s webpage. The crew will also study what happens to the human body after weeks or months in space.

“Wang aims to use the mission to highlight the crew’s explorational spirit, bring a sense of wonder and curiosity to the larger public, and highlight how technology can help push the boundaries of exploration of Earth and through the mission’s research,” SpaceX said in an update on its website.

Since 2020, SpaceX has flown 50 astronauts to low-Earth orbit across 13 human spaceflight missions, more than any private company. These include the three Axiom Space missions, Inspiration4, and eight NASA Commercial Crew rotation missions to the ISS, as well as the Demo-2 test flight.

Competitors Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, meanwhile, have each completed seven commercial human spaceflights.

All three companies, in addition to NASA contractors such as Boeing and Northrop Grumman, are part of an emerging trend that could soon become the norm. NASA has predicted that when the ISS is retired at the end of the decade, it could become one of many customers enlisting the services of private spaceflight companies, rather than a provider of those services.

That could mean more private astronaut missions financed by millionaire and billionaire backers.

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The idea resulted in the famous “Mercury 13,” led by Jerrie Cobb and formed in 1960. Yet many in the U.S. believed that space was no place for a woman, and Russia would become the first country to produce a female astronaut. For many of the Mercury 13, an elite group of women aviators, their hopes were dashed. Yet one would touch space, albeit nearly 60 years later—Wally Funk. 

Mary Wallace Funk was born in 1939 in Las Vegas, New Mexico. Flying was on her mind from an early age, and at 8 she attempted her first flight by jumping off her parents’ roof wearing a Superman cape. While this obviously didn’t work, her mother knew Funk had the grit needed to be a pilot, and at 9 she took her first flying lesson. 

By the time Funk reached high school, mechanics and aviation had captured her heart. She attempted to enroll in courses such as mechanical drawing yet was redirected to more “appropriate” subjects such as home economics. For Funk, this simply wouldn’t do, and she left high school to enroll at Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri. While there, she became a member of the “Flying Susies” and graduated first in her class of 24 pilots. Funk would go on to become a civilian flight instructor at 20, teaching U.S. Army officers. 

At 21, Funk volunteered for NASA’s “Woman in Space” program. Despite being younger than the recommended 25-40, she was selected and would go on to be a part of the elite Mercury 13. The rigorous tests were both physical and mental, and in some of them Funk scored even higher than John Glenn. Despite their success, however, the prevailing idea was that women didn’t belong in space, and the program would be canceled after two years.

Funk would go on to become the 58th woman to earn an airline transport pilot rating, yet could not find work with a carrier due to her gender. Not to be deterred, in 1971 she became the first female FAA flight inspector. In 1973, Funk was promoted to the FAA Systems Worthiness Analysis Program, and in ’74 she was hired by the National Transportation Safety Board as its first female air safety investigator. Funk would spend 11 years in that position until her retirement in 1985. Even in retirement, she kept herself busy as an FAA safety counselor. 

It was in 1995 that the first space shuttle to be piloted by a female (Eileen Collins) was launched. Funk was on hand with several other members of the Mercury 13 to watch their dreams come to fruition.

Yet for Funk, that wouldn’t be the end of her journey to space.

In 2021, Funk finally saw space on the first New Shepard mission, part of Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin project. At the time, the trip made Funk the oldest (82) to fly to space, a record she took from Glenn (77) but was surpassed later that year by William Shatner (90). 

Funk has received countless honors and awards, including from the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, Smithsonian Institution, and alma mater Stephens College. Her time in aviation has included 7,000 students soloed, with 3,000 achieving a multitude of ratings.

Funk, now 85 and residing in Grapevine, Texas, in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, has logged more than 18,600 flight hours in her career. So it’s little wonder why her biography,  Higher, Faster, Longer: My Life in Aviation and My Quest for Spaceflight, remains an inspiring read for flying and space enthusiasts.

Editor’s Note: This article first appeared on Plane & Pilot.

The post Wally Funk: Breaking the Glass Ceiling, All the Way to Space appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Soon, another notable addition will be unveiled around a 45-minute drive or 15-minute helicopter ride from The Strip—the Las Vegas Executive Airport and Spaceport. 

Rob Lauer, a private pilot and real estate developer, outlined plans for the project, which will have an emphasis toward both GA and commercial space operations. 

• READ MORE: FAA Greenlights New Las Vegas Area Airport

“It’s a great addition to the systems in place, which we’ve seen during recent events how busy the airports here were,” Lauer said. “There is a video from the Super Bowl of 60 large aircraft who couldn’t fly in [to existing airports]. Vegas is like nowhere else on earth when it comes to events. We are the leader in the world in entertainment, gaming, tourism, and conventions. People come here for the experience, and we are going to offer an experience with fly-in convention opportunities with our own casino-hotel on site in three to four years, maybe less.” 

The concept of Las Vegas Executive Airport and Spaceport was first envisioned several years ago. Soon after coming up with the idea, Lauer purchased a 240-acre piece of land. 

The airport recently received approvals from the FAA for its submitted 7480-1 form for notice of construction, and the county, key steps toward becoming an operational facility. 

“We own the name Las Vegas Executive Airport, which is the official name, and the plan is really simple,” Lauer said. “To start, we are building a 5,000-foot-long runway and are talking with companies about coming in to operate an FBO, a jet fuel farm, and an MRO facility. In addition to that, we plan to have 40 large 20,000-square-foot hangars with 2,000-square-foot offices for lease.”

While the airport is farther from Las Vegas than several other airports in the area, its remoteness has benefits that the other options do not. 

• READ MORE: Utah Bluff of Juniper and Sagebrush Turned Into Backcountry Destination

“One of the things that came out of our airspace analysis, which was performed by Air Force Brigadier General Robert Novotny (the former commander of the 57th Air Wing at Nellis Air Force Base) is that we are right outside the Class Bravo airspace in open VFR airspace.” Lauer said. “This will make it far more affordable and efficient for aircraft to fly in and out. What our argument was, is that another airport outside the Class Bravo airspace adds to the capacity of the Clark County Airport system.”

The big focus at present is to create the runway and get Las Vegas Executive Airport ready to accept its first visiting aircraft. The runway is currently set to be 4,000 feet long but being at an elevation of 3,700 feet msl, Lauer advised that they are working to add thresholds and extend the landing distance available to 5,000 feet. 

“We are looking at the end of the year to start construction,” he said. “The good news is that it’s a 1 percent grade, so it’s only going to take us a month to grade. It will take a month to pave the runway and taxiways, so we could realistically have our runway up and running by the end of the year. Then maybe a few months after that, pending county approval, we can start building the FBO, hangars, and other infrastructure.”

One of the key aspects planned for the airport is the fly-in hotel, casino, and convention center. One of the planned recurring events on site will be the Las Vegas Air Races. The 2024 event is planned at another airport in the area that is to be announced, but future events are expected to be on site and will take place immediately following the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition. 

Lauer’s vision extends beyond the property being a place for GA traffic, including both drone and spacecraft operations. The spaceport will be the first of its kind. 

• READ MORE: Las Vegas Spaceport to Host Air Racing Event in October 2024 

“There are technically 16 other certified spaceports in the country,” he said. “All of the others are owned by governments (county, state, or federal). Ours is the first private airport and spaceport in the United States. Space companies are a huge part of our project to build a space economy here in Las Vegas. That’s our focus and we hope to bring space planes from all different manufacturers in and operate them from our facility. So, you’ll be able to fly in and do space training activities.”

In July, spaceport leaders officially partnered with the Nevada UAS Test Site Operator UNR Research and Innovation Nevada Center for Applied Research to establish a cutting-edge drone test site on the spaceport’s grounds. The memorandum of understanding (MOU) demonstrates the commitment of the site’s leadership towards investing in the future of aviation.

• READ MORE: New Turf for Blue Cedar Landing

“Nevada must seize the opportunity to cultivate a thriving economy rooted in cutting-edge technology,” Lauer said. “The Las Vegas Spaceport is attracting forward-thinking businesses aligned with our mission to foster a new industry in southern Nevada. We eagerly anticipate collaborating with the Nevada Center for Applied Research to establish a premier drone test site that will serve as a beacon of innovation.”

The post New GA Airport Near Las Vegas Has Its Eye on Space appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

By the time the first manned moon landing took place on July 20, 1969, Charles Schulz had already sent Snoopy into space in the panels of the cartoon. The anthropomorphic dog had a rich fantasy life, and adventure and aviation was part of it. He often donned a cloth flying helmet and red scarf and turned his doghouse into a Sopwith Camel.

According to NASA, Snoopy has been part of its team for more than 50 years. When you see photographs of astronaut workspaces in the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, they often show Snoopy toys on desks or bookshelves. 

Snoopy joined NASA in 1968 as the mascot for the manned spaceflight program. According to multiple articles written about Snoopy joining NASA, it was seen as a risky move, because just months earlier in January 1967, the Apollo 1 capsule caught fire while on the launch pad, killing astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee. No one wanted to make light of the serious business of spaceflight.

But Snoopy proved he had the right stuff. Snoopy’s first foray into space—outside a drawing in the pages of the comic strip—was in 1968 when astronauts Jim Lovell, Frank Borman and Bill Anders took Snoopy lapel pins with them aboard Apollo 8. This became a tradition, and according to NASA, Snoopy is the only NASA astronaut with a career that spans from Apollo to Artemis 1. 

A Snoopy toy beagle has been to the moon, orbited the Earth in a space shuttle, and been to the International Space Station. 

Snoopy became so important that NASA had in-house artists to draw his likeness. The agency also created the Silver Snoopy Award‘, which is a lapel pin given to NASA employees who go above and beyond their duties and provide valuable contributions to make sure the missions are safe and successful.

The award is only bestowed once in a person’s career and the criteria is stringent. What the person does to receive the award must in some fashion support and improve spaceflight. Each lapel pin is flown in space before it is awarded to the team member. 

Meanwhile, Back on Earth…

Terrestrial aviation also celebrates Schulz. In Santa Rosa, California, pilots can fly into Charles M. Schulz Sonoma County Airport (KSTS). Schulz lived in Santa Rosa for 30 years.

The airport was used by the U.S. Army during World War II, and in 1946 transitioned to civilian use. 

Today, Snoopy in his WWI flying ace persona atop his doghouse is part of the airport logo. In addition, fixes for ILS for Runway 32 have Peanuts-inspired names. Because instrument approach fixes are required to have five letters in their names the FAA could be creative.  There is an intermediate approach fix labeled LUSEE, and the glideslope intercept is PIGPN.

The post Snoopy in Space Has Spanned the Decades appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The approximately weeklong mission—which will take NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to the ISS and back—is intended to be Starliner’s final test flight before NASA certifies it for Commercial Crew rotation missions to the orbital laboratory. It would be the first crewed launch on ULA’s Atlas V rocket, which will send the spacecraft into orbit, and the first on the Atlas family of rockets in more than half a century.

An initial Starliner CFT launch attempt, scheduled for May 6, was scrubbed hours before takeoff due to an oscillating pressure regulation valve on the Atlas V’s upper stage. Boeing and NASA then pushed back the mission to May 10, later revising their timeline to Friday after successfully replacing the faulty valve.

Now, a new issue—involving the Starship capsule itself, rather than Atlas V—is holding up things.

NASA and Boeing on Tuesday said Starliner crews discovered a small helium leak on the spacecraft’s service module “traced to a flange on a single reaction control system thruster.”

The service module, which unlike Starliner’s crew module is expendable, is designed to power and maneuver the autonomous spacecraft. It is equipped with 28 reaction control system engines, designed by Boeing supplier Aerojet Rocketdyne, that generate 100 pounds of thrust each and stabilize the capsule in orbit. Helium allows the thrusters to fire and is neither toxic nor combustible.

Starliner teams are working to address the issue and conduct additional testing, resulting in the new target launch date of Tuesday.

“As a part of the testing, Boeing will bring the propulsion system up to flight pressurization just as it does prior to launch, and then allow the helium system to vent naturally to validate existing data and strengthen flight rationale,” the company said.

Boeing and NASA added that no further issues have arisen since the scrubbed launch on May 6.

Starliner successfully reached the ISS for the first and only time during an uncrewed test flight in 2022. But since Boeing unveiled the concept for the spacecraft in 2010, the program has been bogged down by delays. The CFT has been no exception.

NASA intends for Starliner to serve as a redundant alternative to SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule—which, like Starliner, was designed to ferry astronauts to low-Earth orbit destinations—in the case of a contingency, such as the one that stranded astronaut Frank Rubio in space for six months (and helped Rubio achieve a U.S. spaceflight record in the process). Crew Dragon has flown all eight Commercial Crew missions to date under a contract with the space agency agreed upon in 2014, which has since been extended.

NASA and Boeing have a similar contract, worth $4.2 billion, for six missions, the first of which could fly early next year if all goes according to plan Tuesday.

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The post Boeing, NASA Delay Starliner Again Due to New Issue appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

NASA’s DC-8 Airborne Science Laboratory on Wednesday will make its final flight to Idaho State University in Pocatello, where aspiring aircraft technicians will train on it through the college’s aircraft maintenance technology program.

The swan song flight of the testbed aircraft, which has flown 158 science missions over more than three decades, will not be scientific. But the hope is that it can inspire a new generation of aviators and researchers.

“The DC-8 flew missions all over the world,” said Michael Thomson, chief of the science projects branch at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in California. “The work we did on that aircraft will make a difference to future generations in improved weather forecasting, monitoring glacial ice thickness, air quality, and improving our ability to predict the development of hurricanes from tropical storms.”

The Airborne Research Laboratory is a highly modified, four-engine Douglas DC-8 used by federal, state, academic, and foreign researchers, as well as companies such as Boeing and United Airlines, that has been flying since 1987.

The massive aircraft is 157 feet long with a 148-foot wingspan, large enough to seat up to 45 researchers and flight crew and carry 30,000 pounds of scientific cargo. It has a range of 5,400 nm and flight time of 12 hours, flying within the atmosphere between 1,000 and 42,000 feet in altitude.

The DC-8 is equipped with a suite of sensors and data systems as well as Iridium and Inmarsat satellite communications that make it suitable for a variety of missions. It is primarily used to test satellite sensors and space-borne lasers, validate satellite data, provide tracking and telemetry for space launch vehicles reentering the atmosphere, and perform a range of other studies. 

Data collected by the aircraft has been used for studies in a range of disciplines, from biology to volcanology. It was a key contributor, for example, to NASA’s Operation IceBridge, the largest airborne survey of Earth’s polar ice.

“The DC-8 has flown scientists on a lot of missions to look at atmospheric composition, for which the most important applications are air quality,” said Hal Maring, NASA Earth Science Division scientist. “The DC-8 enabled NASA scientists to develop a better understanding of air quality; what makes it good, or what makes it bad.”

The flying laboratory completed its final scientific flight, the Airborne and Satellite Investigation of Asian Air Quality, or ASIA-AQ, mission, on April 1.

Earlier this month, DC-8 team members past and present congregated at NASA Armstrong’s Building 703 at Edwards Air Force Base—which housed the aircraft during much of its three-decade stint—to reminisce about its contributions to science.

The DC-8 has traveled far and wide in its quest for scientific discovery, flying high into the atmosphere and over all seven continents. Bill Brockett, who flew the aircraft for 28 years, said a 2009 expedition to Antarctica was his favorite.

“The science instrumentation required that we fly from 500 feet to 1,000 feet altitude,” Brockett said. “It required total focus for the six or seven hours at low altitude to successfully complete a mission…We were low enough that we occasionally got glimpses of seals lounging on the ice.”

Some missions sent researchers into harrowing situations, such as the eye of a storm. For example, Chris Jennison, a retired DC-8 mission manager, routinely flew into hurricanes.

“I don’t miss stark terror,” Jennison said. “The thing about flying [into] hurricanes is that it’s not intuitively obvious where the dangerous places are.”

Other missions required crewmembers to act on the fly, so to speak.

“During the recent [ASIA-AQ] mission we had an engine failure,” said Brian Hobbs, the current Armstrong DC-8 manager. “The logistics and procurement teams acted quickly to get the engine shipped, and the crew was able to get the engine replaced, tested, and ready to go. That could have been the end of the campaign, but our team made it happen.”

A common theme among current and former DC-8 team members was the infectious enthusiasm and camaraderie of scientists aboard the flying laboratory.

“Some of these people had been working for years trying to get their experiment out there and prove a hypothesis they are working on,” said Randy Albertson, former deputy director of NASA’s Airborne Science Program. “The energy they brought in was like recharging one’s batteries. They loved talking about the science.”

Those are just pleasant memories now. The good news, however, is that the flying laboratory will live out its final days surrounded by curious minds at Idaho State.

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The post NASA Teams Remember Flying Science Laboratory as It Heads for Retirement appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The company’s massive rocket and Super Heavy booster, which when stacked together stand nearly 400 feet tall, have been grounded since March as the FAA conducts a mishap investigation into Starship’s third uncrewed orbital test flight.

However, Musk on Saturday posted an image to social media platform X—which he acquired in October 2022—of Starship and Super Heavy being moved back to the company’s Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas, which hosted the rocket’s first three test flights.

In response to a query about the date of the fourth flight, called Integrated Flight Test 4 or IFT-4, Musk gave a timeline of three to five weeks. That would place the next launch sometime in June.

SpaceX has a hit-or-miss track record when it comes to predicting Starship launches. Gwynne Shotwell, the company’s chief operating officer, said in March for example that IFT-4 could launch as soon as early May.

During the lead-up to Starship’s second test flight, which ultimately launched in November, Musk gave a timeline of six to eight weeks in April and again in June. In September, he said the rocket was “ready to launch” and was swiftly rebuffed by the FAA. However, on November 3, SpaceX correctly predicted that Starship would launch again by the middle of the month.

Starship’s three test flights have improved on each attempt but resulted in groundings of varying lengths by the FAA. The agency’s initial investigation spanned from April to November. The second took half as long, wrapping up between November and February.

Given the improvements made to Starship and Starbase before the rocket’s second flight test—such as the installation of a water-cooled steel plate beneath the launch pad to contain debris—and the relative success of its third flight test, SpaceX could be looking at a similar timeline of around three months for the current investigation. That would put it in line to close in June, making Musk’s prediction appear feasible.

Musk and SpaceX have already set ambitious goals for Starship’s fourth flight. The biggest will be to survive reentry into Earth’s atmosphere, which is where the previous mission failed. Both Starship and the Super Heavy booster are designed to be reusable.

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The post SpaceX Starship Will Fly Again in 3-5 Weeks, Elon Musk Predicts appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

ValveTech, a manufacturer previously hired by Boeing supplier Aerojet Rocketdyne to build valves for Starliner’s propulsion system, is warning NASA to “immediately halt” the spacecraft’s first crewed launch, which may come as early as Friday.

The company—which sued Aerojet in 2017 alleging a violation of nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) and misuse of trade secrets—urged the space agency to “redouble safety checks and re-examine safety protocols” before the mission, which was scrubbed on May 6 due to a valve issue.

The faulty valve was located on United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) Atlas V rocket, which will launch Starliner into orbit. Tory Bruno, president and CEO of ULA, addressed ValveTech president Erin Faville’s comments directly in a post on social media platform X.

“Not sure what to say about this one,” Bruno wrote. “Close to none of it is correct: Not urgent. Not leaking. Etc. Remarkable that the particular person quoted doesn’t seem to know how this type of valve works…”

ValveTech says it supplies 14 valve components to Starliner vendors, but ULA tells FLYING it is not one of them. ValveTech did not immediately respond to FLYING’s request for comment.

Starliner has been described by NASA as a redundant alternative to SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule, which so far has flown eight Commercial Crew astronaut rotation missions to the International Space Station (ISS). Starliner, similarly, was designed as a reusable spacecraft to ferry astronauts to low-Earth orbit destinations.

The Starliner CFT, which had already been delayed several times, was scrubbed earlier this month due to an oscillating pressure regulation valve on the Atlas V rocket, forcing NASA to push back the launch to no earlier than Friday at 6:16 p.m. EDT.

Although NASA and ULA have already investigated and decided to remove and replace the valve, Faville warned against catastrophe should they attempt another launch.

“As a valued NASA partner and as valve experts, we strongly urge them not to attempt a second launch due to the risk of a disaster occurring on the launchpad,” said Faville. “According to media reports, a buzzing sound indicating the leaking valve was noticed by someone walking by the Starliner minutes before launch. This sound could indicate that the valve has passed its life cycle.”

NASA and ULA made no mention of a leaking valve in their assessments of the incident, saying only that the valve was oscillating abnormally.

“After evaluating the valve history, data signatures from the launch attempt, and assessing the risks relative to continued use, the ULA team determined the valve exceeded its qualification and mission managers agreed to remove and replace the valve,” NASA wrote in a blog post.

Faville later clarified that she is not calling for a permanent end to the Starliner program but rather a more thorough assessment of safety concerns.

“What I said was that NASA needs to redouble safety checks and re-examine safety protocols to make sure the Starliner is safe before trying to launch the Starliner again,” said Faville. “As a valued NASA partner, it would make no sense and not be in my company’s interest to end this mission.”

Since parting ways in 2017, ValveTech and Aerojet, a division of defense contractor L3Harris, have been tangled in a prolonged legal dispute. That year, ValveTech filed suit alleging that Aerojet breached NDAs and misused trade secrets in developing the flight valve for Starliner’s service module propulsion system.

In November, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York ruled that Aerojet had indeed breached two NDAs—awarding ValveTech $850,000 in damages—but had not misappropriated trade secrets.

According to Payload Space, the company sought further restrictions on Aerojet, but a judge closed the case on May 6.

In its statement regarding the May 6 launch scrub, ValveTech raised concerns about an earlier issue with one of Starliner’s valves. But the events appear to be unrelated.

In August 2021, Boeing scrubbed Starliner’s first uncrewed flight test due to a problem with the spacecraft’s service module propulsion system—the same system ValveTech alleges Aerojet built using trade secrets.

ValveTech alleges that “NASA, Boeing, and Aerojet…qualified this valve for [Starliner CFT] without proper supporting data or previous history or legacy information,” citing witness testimony from its November trial.

However, according to NASA and ULA, the incident on May 6 involved a pressure regulation valve on ULA’s Atlas V rocket—not the service module, which is on the Starliner capsule itself.

“The concerns raised by ValveTech in relation to the Crew Flight Test (CFT) mission are not applicable to the pressure regulation valve with off nominal performance during the first launch attempt,” a ULA spokesperson told FLYING.

ValveTech and Faville’s comments appear unlikely to deter NASA and Boeing from attempting a second Starliner CFT launch as early as Friday.

The companies have a $4.2 billion contract that includes six Commercial Crew rotation missions to the ISS on an unspecified timeline. SpaceX’s Crew Dragon already fills that role for the space agency. But NASA hopes to put a second spacecraft in the rotation for redundancy in the case of a contingency.

Safety, of course, remains a priority for the space agency. But with the program now several years behind schedule and an estimated $1.5 billion over budget, stakeholders will be eager to see Starliner fly with a crew as soon as possible.

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The post ULA Pushes Back on Warning to NASA to Halt Boeing Starliner Launch appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

The agency says it plans to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) on the potential effects of awarding a commercial launch vehicle operator license for Starship operations at Kennedy’s Launch Complex-39A. To date, all Starship test flights have launched from SpaceX’s Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas, which serves as its primary research, development, and flight test facility for the gargantuan rocket.

SpaceX will need to obtain a vehicle operator license before launching Starship from Kennedy, an action that falls under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the FAA says. As such, it and NASA determined an EIS to be the appropriate level of scrutiny. 

SpaceX will prepare the assessment itself under FAA supervision, at NASA’s request. Obtaining the EIS would not guarantee the issuance of a vehicle operator license, but it is a required step under NEPA.

SpaceX’s proposal calls for the construction of launch, landing, and other infrastructure at Launch Complex-39A that would support as many as 44 launches per year using Starship and the company’s Super Heavy booster. The site hosts launches of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.

The new infrastructure would allow Starship—which is designed to be reusable—to land back on the launchpad or a droneship, a sea-borne landing platform. The proposal also calls for expendable rocket and booster landings in the Atlantic Ocean.

The FAA will hold one virtual and three in-person public scoping meetings, inviting relevant agencies and organizations, local Native American tribes, and members of the public to submit comments on the potential environmental impacts of the proposal.

The submission period for public comments opened Friday with the publication in the Federal Register of an FAA notice of intent to prepare the EIS. Stakeholders can attend in-person scoping meetings on June 12 and 13, followed by a virtual meeting on June 17. More information is available on the FAA website.

Starship so far has flown three uncrewed orbital test flights, each more successful than the last. However, the first of those flights, which launched in April 2023, caused a litany of unintended environmental effects, shattering windows and sending plumes of ashy particulate as far as 6 miles away from Starbase.

The debris field created by the launch had a far wider radius than anticipated, due in part to SpaceX’s decision to forgo the installation of a water-cooled steel plate beneath the launchpad. A water deluge system was installed for Starship’s second test flight, which greatly improved containment of the debris field.

Following Starship’s first test flight, a coalition of environmental groups also sued the FAA over its handling of the launch. The groups accuse the agency of allowing SpaceX to take the reins on evaluating the rocket’s environmental impact.

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