The American private space player, SpaceX, successfully completed the static fire test of its Falcon 9 booster on the 11th of January 2020. Therefore, the booster is ready to launch SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft for its flight abort test. Following the success, the space agency tweeted that the highly anticipated mission booster is going to launch on the 18th of January.
The Upcoming Test in Details
The upcoming abort test is instrumental for the safety of the crew passengers during the upcoming human-crewed missions. In the test, the abort thruster would pull the capsule from the rocket, in case of technical failure and under other emergencies. Once the capsule separated from the booster, it will descend gradually using parachutes and will land several miles off the coast of Florida. On October 30th, Kathy Lueders is the manager of the commercial crew program of NASA. She revealed that the capsule is going to separate from the booster after 88 seconds of the launch.
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More About The Test
Previously, SpaceX faced a failure in a similar launch way back in April 2019. But, later, the space agency made some modifications for the future launch. As a result, the scheduled launch delayed further by around six months. In the October meeting, Kathy Lueders praised the modification done by the SpaceX.
In November 2018, the authorities from the Federal Aviation Administration confirmed that the proposed abort system would take place between the 83 to 100 seconds of the launch. At the time of the launch, the rocket to attain an altitude of 14.6 to 27.8 kilometers. The speed is going to be between 1.5 to 2.5 Mach.
The abort test is instrumental as it is the last step before carrying out the human-crewed mission by the private entity. If the test becomes a success, SpaceX will carry two of the NASA astronauts, Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, into the International Space Station.
