SpaceX launches NASA’s Europa Clipper on a Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center – Spaceflight Now

Hot on the heels of successfully catching a launch vehicle in mid-air during Sunday’s Starship Flight 5 mission, SpaceX is preparing to launch a Falcon Heavy rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center around noon on Monday.

On board the trinuclear spacecraft is NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft, which will embark on a year-long expedition to Jupiter’s moon Europa. NASA believes this moon, distinguished by its icy exterior and ocean beneath, may hold clues that the building blocks for life could exist on a celestial body other than Earth.

Europa Clipper is sent on an escape route to Earth to begin a nearly six-year mission to its namesake moon. The mission’s launch from Launch Complex 39A is scheduled for 12:06 p.m. EDT (1606 UTC). The launch time can be moved up to 15 seconds earlier if necessary to avoid possible collisions with objects in orbit.

Spaceflight Now’s live broadcast begins approximately one hour and 15 minutes before launch.

This Falcon Heavy mission is a unique circumstance that requires SpaceX to use up all three of the rocket’s boosters. On most Falcon Heavy flights, the two side boosters are flown back to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station after separation from the central booster, which is not recovered.

“Falcon Heavy gives Europa Clipper its best, sending this spacecraft to the furthest destination we have ever sent, meaning the mission requires maximum performance,” said Julianna Scheiman, director of NASA science missions for SpaceX, during a Media conference before the start.

“I don’t know about you, but I can’t think of a better mission where we would sacrifice boosters for the chance of perhaps discovering life in our own solar system.”

The mission is the sixth and final flight for side boosters 1064 and 1065, which will conduct their sixth and final launch. Both previously supported launches of USSF-44, USSF-67, Jupiter-3/EchoStar-24, NASA’s Psyche and USSF-52.

Due to the impact of Hurricane Milton, the mission was originally scheduled for October 13, but NASA and SpaceX decided to postpone the mission by 24 hours. During the conference call, Scheiman said this was due to an issue that arose during a pre-launch mission assessment. SpoaceX calls it a “paranoia scrub.”

“During this process, we encountered a quality control issue related to our vehicle hoses. And there are hoses attached all over the place in different parts of the rocket. Therefore, we worked closely with our NASA Launch Services Program team to investigate what hardware was installed on the vehicle that was suspicious and needed to be evaluated as part of this issue and to ensure that it was subject to the necessary checks when necessary and performed validations,” said Scheiman.

“So we basically make sure that every system has gone through an acceptance test or a validation test or an additional type of inspection to ensure that the vehicle and the hardware that is currently on the vertical platform is ready to fly.”

Tim Dunn, the senior launch director of NASA’s Launch Services Program (LSP), added that SpaceX addressed the issue late last week and NASA agreed that the issue needed further work.

“Our teams worked hand in hand for most of Friday evening and all day (Saturday) to achieve a very confident risk posture today (Sunday) as we began our launch readiness reviews,” Dunn said. “So we’re in very good shape and we appreciate SpaceX’s paranoia.”

Although the mission is a NASA-led mission, it does not require the Federal Aviation Administration’s commercial launch licensing process, but the issue of the Falcon 9 upper stage anomaly that occurred during the Crew 9 mission arose during of the briefing before the start.

Scheiman said the rocket’s second stage Merlin vacuum engine, which is the same one used on a Falcon Heavy, burned for 500 milliseconds after the deorbit burn shutdown command was given.

“That half-second of additional thrust essentially caused the second stage to slowly re-enter Earth’s atmosphere outside of the designated zone to land in the South Pacific,” she said. “Everything reacted as intended in our vehicle. We essentially ordered a backup Merlin vacuum shutdown process that closed the open engine liquid oxygen vent valve, successfully shutting down the MVac engine.”

NASA followed SpaceX’s analysis of the problem closely and said it was confident in its conclusions, but also conducted its own reviews to be extra sure.

“We naturally partnered with SpaceX because the Crew 9 mission is close to the Europa Clipper planetary window, and SpaceX quickly led us to resolve this anomaly,” Dunn said. “We held our own independent technical review panel just one day after our flight readiness review, where we assessed Europa Clipper and cleared it of this anomaly.”

Explore Europe

The trip to the icy moon Europa has been under discussion since the late 1990s and was envisioned as a successor to the Galileo space probe, which orbited Jupiter from 1995 to 1997.

The National Research Council recommended a mission to Europe in 2013, at an estimated cost at the time of about $2 billion. By around 2019, mission cost estimates rose to around $4.25 billion, and currently the total cost of the mission is estimated at $5.2 billion.

When fully fueled, the spacecraft weighs approximately 5,700 kg (~12,566 lbs.) and is powered by 28 engines. Due to its size, with its solar panels unfolded, it is longer than a normal basketball court.

After separating the spacecraft from the Falcon Heavy’s upper stage, Europa Clipper project manager Jordan Evans said the team would first work to acquire the signal from the spacecraft, which would take a few minutes. This was followed by about two to three hours of the Europa Clipper “rolling like a rotisserie to warm up (its) solar cell mechanisms,” and then using what Evans called “thermal knives” to cut the solar cell mounts over the course of about 30 minutes to cut through.

“It takes about 30 minutes for the spacecraft to cut through all nine per side. So it does eight per side and then about 30 minutes after the solar system starts disconnecting, it cuts off the ninth on each side,” Evans explained. “This happens approximately three to three and a half hours after launch and it will be a while before we can determine the status of the vehicle after the solar system is disconnected.”

The journey to Europe will take five and a half years, with Clipper scheduled to arrive on April 11, 2030. The trip includes a Mars gravity assist on March 1, 2025 and an Earth gravity assist in December 2026.

Sandra Connelly, deputy associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, said she was “very excited” for the mission, explaining that it is “a very important part of our (science) portfolio because it brings us one step closer to answering fundamental questions.” “about our solar system and our place in it.”

“Scientists believe Europe has suitable conditions beneath its icy surface to support life. Its conditions are water, energy, chemistry and stability,” Connelly said. “To do this, we will collect data from nine instruments and one scientific experiment. The science involves collecting measurements of the inner ocean; mapping surface composition and geology; and looking for plumes of water vapor that may be emerging from the icy crust.”

While Europa Clipper is at Jupiter, it will conduct about 50 flybys of Europa at its closest approach, which is about 25 km (16 miles) above its surface.