SpaceX Falcon 9 V1.1 - ORBCOMM OG2-1 - Launching July 14, 2014
Screenshot from SpaceX Webcast of the launch of ORBCOMM OG2-1
Mission Rundown:
SpaceX Falcon 9 V1.1 - ORBCOMM OG2-1
Written: February 4, 2021
We got legs. We got Ocean. What’s missing?
SpaceX is targeting to launch ORBCOMM OG2 Mission 1 on Monday, June 14, 2014. The launch window opens at 15:15 UTC. Source.
OrbComm is a family of low Earth orbit communications satellites, operated by the American satellite communications company OrbComm. As of July 2014, 51 such satellites have orbited Earth, with 50 still continuing to do so.
The Payload
OrbComm Generation 2 (OrbComm-OG2) second-generation satellites are intended to supplement and eventually replace the current first generation constellation. Eighteen satellites were ordered by 2008—nominally intended to be launched in three groups of six during 2010–2014—and by 2015 have all been launched, on three flights. OrbComm has options for a further thirty OG2 spacecraft.
The first OrbComm-OG2 launch with a Dragon didn’t go well, when NASA insisted that their mission to the ISS took priority, when the first stage booster V1.0 couldn’t lift the second stage all the way up in orbit, because a Merlin 1C failed during ascent.
The OrbComm-OG2 satellite was for safety reasons left in a too low orbit, so it burned up a few days later on 9 October 2012.
The second launch, with a constellation of six OG2 satellites, launched on July 14, 2014. The payload included six satellites weighing 172 kg (379 lb) each and two 142 kg (313 lb) mass simulators.
Elon Musk and OrbComm planned in the early days to launch the 18 Orbcomm-OG2 one by one on the smaller Falcon 1e rocket. But Falcon 9 V1.1 could launch six, and Falcon 9 Full Thrust could launch the rest, meaning 11 satellites weighing 172 kg (379 lb) each and one 142 kg (313 lb) mass simulator.
The prime contractor for the OG2 program is the Sierra Nevada Corporation, with Argon ST of Virginia producing their communications subsystems.
Each spacecraft is based on Sierra Nevada’s SN-100A bus, with a mass of 172 kilograms (380 lb) and is designed for an operational lifespan of at least five years. The spacecraft are each powered by a gallium-arsenide solar panel producing 400 watts of electrical power. Each OG2 spacecraft is three-axis stabilized with hydrazine thrusters used for attitude control.
The satellites’ communications systems offer transfer rates up to four megabits per second at VHF frequencies between 137 and 153 megahertz, with each vehicle also carrying an Automatic Identification System (AIS) receiver to pick up identification and tracking signals broadcast by ships at sea – OrbComm intends to sell this data to coastguard services.
1, 2, 3 testing. Just testing
Following the end of the use of the first stage for the OrbComm orbital mission, SpaceX used the booster stage—which would ordinarily be destroyed on reentering the Earth's atmosphere and impact with the ocean—for a flight test of a number of reusable launch vehicle technologies to safely reenter and execute a "soft vertical landing" on the ocean surface. This is the third attempt on a controlled descent and landing on water.
Equipped for the second time with landing legs, the first-stage booster successfully conducted a controlled-descent test consisting of a burn (boost back or brake burn) for deceleration from hypersonic velocity in the upper atmosphere, a reentry burn through the atmosphere, and a final landing burn before soft-landing on the ocean surface.
The first stage was not recovered as the hull integrity was breached on landing or on the subsequent "tip over and body slam". The First stage is about 47 meter high - 154 feet, so it packs a serious punch, when the top hits the water. Tweet from Elon Musk.
NASA WB-57 and Falcon 900EX on flight tracker. They will both monitor and record B1007 flight telemetry during the boost break burn, reentry burn and landing burn after stage separation.
The RP-1 fuel tank wasn’t depressurized so the petroleum vapors went Kaboom. That punctured the propellant tanks and booster B1007 went down engines first.
