SpaceX Falcon 9 - Iridium-4 NEXT

  SpaceX Falcon 9 Full Thrust - Iridium-4 NEXT - Launching December 22/23, 2017

Screenshot from SpaceX live feed because Tim Dodd had a small corner picture

Mission Rundown: SpaceX FT - Iridium-4 NEXT

Written: January 22, 2021

Lift Off Time	December 23, 2017 - 01:27:34 UTC December 22, 2017 - 17:27:34 PST
Mission Name	Iridium-4 NEXT
Launch Provider	SpaceX
Customer	Iridium Communications Inc.
Rocket	Falcon 9 Full Thrust serial number B1036-2
Launch Location	Space Launch Complex 4 East - SLC-4E Vandenberg Air Force Base, California
Payload	10 Iridium NEXT Communication Satellites
Payload mass	8 600 kg ~ 18 960 pounds + 1 000 kg dispenser
Where are the satellites going?	Polar LEO - 628 km × 625 km in a 86.66° degree orbit
Will they be attempting to recover the first stage?	No - One way ticket flying semi “bareback” with grid fins but no landing legs
Where will the first stage land?	Softly in the Pacific Ocean doing a landing test profile for future Block 5 boosters
Will they be attempting to recover the fairings?	Yes - A fast boat Mr Steven is attempting its very first fairing catch in the Pacific Ocean
Are these fairings new?	Yes - Two Type 1 boat hull sized fairings - 34 x 17 feet with 10 evenly spaced ventilation ports in a circle
This will be the:	– 46th flight of all Falcon 9 rockets – 22nd flight of a Full Trust “V1.2” rocket – 5th re-flight of Falcon 9 Full Trust boosters – 7th SpaceX launch from SLC-4E – 26th crash landing. Soft, hard, deliberate, Ups... – 18th mission for SpaceX in 2017
Where to watch Where to read more	SpaceX link Other link Tim Dodd live stream And I will huff and puff and blow your house down

Launch debriefing (This is what happend)

- - T-00:14:26 Host: T 00:00:00 T+00:01:08 T+00:02:34 T+00:02:42 T+00:02:48 T+00:03:12 T+00:05:52 T+00:07:01 T+00:09:04 - - T+00:51:07 T+00:52:08 - T+00:57:14 - - - - - - -

Mission run down from 0:00 then Q&A nice echo Sound difficulties from Tim Dodd’s studio SpaceX live but mute feed at 17:58 - Speakers on John Insprucker enjoys the sunset launch Liftoff at 32:26 - All T+ now from SpaceX Webcast MaxQ at 33:14 - No delay on up looking camera MECO 35:00, stage separation 35:02 SES-1 at 35:08 - Velocity 7 254  km/h - Altitude 83,1 km Boost brake burn at 35:14 for 31 seconds ish... Fairing  separation at 35:38 Entry burn 37:45 by 3 Merlin 1D+ for 30 seconds ish... Water landing burn 38:54 by 3 Merlin 1D+ for 12 ish... SECO at 41:29 - Velocity 28 467 km/h - Altitude 182 km Q&A until 1:23:55 - Rare LOX tank view at SECO - Pay attention to the two large black Helium gas tanks SpaceX resume live but mute feed at 1:23:58 SES-2 - SECO-2 gave a velocity boost from 26 662 km/h to 27 100 km/h in 4-5 seconds at 1:24:34 1st deployment at 1:29:40 - T+00:58:54 - T+01:00:34 - T+01:02:14 - T+01:03:54 - T+01:05:34 - T+01:07:14 - T+01:08:54 - T+01:10:34 - T+01:12:14 1:48:03 Hilarious UFO videos from L.A. residents. Elon Musk should apologize like Orson Welles did after his “War of the worlds radio broadcast”. But see this. Rap up from Tim Dodd at 1:55:02 Both fairings got wet in the ocean - no catch of the day

CRS-13	Iridium-4 Next	ZUMA	GovSat-1 SES-16	Falcon Heavy 1
PAZ MicroSat 1&2	Hispasat 30W-6	Iridium-5 Next	CRS-14	TESS

Replacing the booster inventory

SpaceX successfully launched Iridium-4 NEXT on December 22, 2017 at 5:27 p.m. PST on a reused Falcon 9 B1036-2 from SLC-4E at Vandenberg. The first stage was expended.

SpaceX will be launching a reused Falcon 9 booster to launch 10 Iridium NEXT satellites for Iridium. This is the first time Iridium has chosen to fly on a reflown booster and they will also use one for Iridium-5 NEXT as well. The booster B1036-2 launched Iridium-2 NEXT in June 2017. SpaceX is gaining reputation and reliability as a launch provider, who can deliver a cheaper safer launch capability.

Iridium NEXT 4 is 10 x 860 kg satellites heading into a Low Earth Polar Orbit. This means the launch will be out of Vandenberg Air Force Base, which is where all Polar Orbits launch from. This might also be the first launch, where we see SpaceX officially attempt to catch and not just recover fairings, as they have a boat, Mr Steven, that is speculated to try and catch them on a big net.

The Payload

Iridium NEXT flight 4 will launch the 10 Iridium NEXT satellites into orbit plane 2. One of these Iridium NEXT satellites will then drift to orbit plane 1 who will be filled with the Iridium NEXT from flight 5 Not Earlier Than - NET late March 2018.

A total number of 81 Iridium NEXT Satellites will be built for Iridium, with 66 satellites being needed for a fully operational constellation. All of the satellites will carry ADS-B aviation tracking hosted payloads for the company Aireon, and 60 of the satellites will carry AIS maritime tracking hosted payloads for another company exactEarth.

Falcon 9 will carry a payload mass of 8 600kg for 10 satellites + 1 000kg extra mass for the dispenser equal to 9 600kg mass total. The initial launch orbit is a circular orbit on 625km, with 86.66 degrees inclination and the operational orbit is a higher circular orbit on 778km, with a slightly less inclination of 86.4 degrees.

The Satellite Network Operations Center immediately began running initial diagnostics as soon as the newly deployed Iridium NEXT satellites were captured by our network, just minutes after they were deployed. This testing process has been running smoothly and will continue for several weeks, after which nine of the new Iridium NEXT satellites will begin their individual ascents to the operational orbit plane 2, replacing original old vehicles aka. Iridium Block 1 satellites.

The Iridium constellation consists of six polar orbiting planes, each containing 11 operational crosslinked Iridium NEXT satellites, for a total of 66 Iridium NEXT satellites in the active constellation.  This unique architecture creates a web of coverage around the earth, enabling Iridium to provide real-time communications over the oceans and from even the most remote locations.

The first two Iridium NEXT satellites, SV131 and SV134 were put in service today through our "slot swap" process on January 12, 2018. By February 5, 2018 all Iridium NEXT from the Iridium-4 NEXT launch assigned to orbital plane 2 has been ascended to mission altitude and are now actively providing service. Number 10 was still shifting orbit plane.

This brings a total of 32 Iridium NEXT satellites into active service, nearly half of the full constellation. 8 of them must either be spare Iridium NEXT satellites or getting ready to relieve the old Iridium Block 1 satellites.

Four additional Iridium NEXT launches are scheduled for the first half of 2018, bringing Iridium’s total to 75 new satellites in orbit, including nine spares.

Author Tim Dodd link

Coauthor/Text Retriever Johnny Nielsen link to launch list