Screenshot from the 425 Project Flight 1 launch. Such a beautiful sunset… Now we wait for it…
Mission Rundown: SpaceX - 425 Project Flight 1
Written: December 1, 2023
Put on your shades. Dude
South Korea’s Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) has contracted SpaceX to launch the first of five spy satellites. The first launch on a Falcon 9 rocket will be the 800-kilogram electro-optical infrared telescope satellite launched to low Earth orbit and to be placed in a sun synchronous orbit between 600 and 700 km.
In response to Pyongyang's efforts to put its first spy satellite into space, South Korean President Shin vowed to boost the South Korean military's surveillance capability to fend off North Korea's advancing missile and nuclear threat.
Lift Off took place on Friday, December 1, 2023 at 10:19 PST - 18:19:00 UTC from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base.
The Falcon 9 rocket will be composed of booster B1061-17, its 287th second stage and a pair of old reused fairings containing the 425 Project Flight 1 satellite weighing 800 Kg.
The Falcon 9 didn’t perform a static fire test of the engines. This has been omitted many times due to Falcon 9’s increasing reliability. Only after engine swabs and issues with the importance of the payload does a static fire test become necessary.
B1061-17 will have made its seventeenth flight after launching its next mission:
After separating from the second stage, the booster B1061-17 will return to Landing Zone LZ-4 some 400 meters from the launch site SLC-4E.
NGA from Raul with the 425 Project Flight 1’s SSO flightpath from Vandenberg SFB SLC-4 East
After refurbishment of the booster, it will be designated as B1061-18. The second stage will after payload deployment be deorbited in the Pacific Ocean east of New Zealand a couple of hours after the launch.
The fairings are both reused, flying for the fifth and sixth time with no known previous missions flown together. Go Beyond will recover them 385 km downrange.
The 425 Project Flight 1 payload
425 Project Flight 1 is the first of five launches for the South Korean Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA), which will take one reconnaissance satellite featuring an electro-optical infrared (EO/IR) telescope to orbit. Four more synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites will be launched by 2025. The project is led by the Korean Agency for Defense Development (ADD) and Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), assisted by Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI), Hanwha Systems and Thales Alenia Space.
The 425 Project Flight 1 satellite and the following four satellites will be launched to low Earth orbit between 600 and 700 km, giving the South Korea’s military the ability to observe North Korean key military facilities every two hours with 30-50 cm resolution imagery.
24 other caught the Korean wave
24 CubeSats will catch a ride with South Korea’s first spy satellite, so very little will be known or shown about them after fairing jettison. EIRSAT-1 caught a ride as the shuffling for position on other rockets fell through, even if Transporter 9 had room for EIRSAT-1 earlier this month, it was committed with this Falcon 9 launch.
You booked the friggin ticket already, now fly with us
Ireland’s first-ever satellite EIRSAT-1, a gamma-ray burst hunting CubeSat, should launch into low-Earth orbit in 2017. Designed and manufactured by Ireland’s University College Dublin (UCD), the mission (with costs on the order of a few million euro)* will see launch atop a multi-payload Ariane rocket provided by the European Space Agency (ESA).
Well that didn’t happen, so after a long hunt for a ride to space, the satellite has now left Ireland on its way to Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, USA. Launch is currently slated for launch on 29 November on a Space X Falcon 9 rocket.
425 Project Flight 1 and with it EIRSAT-1 is now postponed to December 1, 2023
The Armenian ministry reports that the High-Tech Industry Hayasat-1 satellite launch was prosphoned. It will be sent into orbit along with the Korean 425 Project Flight 1 by SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket on Friday, at 10:18 p.m. Armenia time.
The Australian-made SpIRIT nanosatellite is scheduled for along with the Korean 425 Project Flight 1 by SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket on Friday, which means we’re getting very close to the in-orbit demonstration of some amazing home-grown technology.
The SpIRIT mission has been led by the University of Melbourne, with key Australian project partners Inovor Technologies, Neumann Space, Nova Systems and SITAEL Australia.
SpIRIT is the first Australian satellite to carry a foreign space agency’s scientific instrument as its main payload, namely the Italian Space Agency’s HERMES X-ray detector.
ISL48 from Space BD’s is probably a Dutch small satellite launch integrator, which when translated from alphabet soup it’s ISIS Space’s Launch 48
uHETSat from SITAEL’s - now on its fourth launch attempt now with Falcon 9
D-Orbit’s ION SCV-012 Daring Diego with?
Bane from York Space Systems
GNOMES-4 from PlanetIQ’s
BRO-4 from Unseelabs
RADCUBE
SUNSTORM
LEDSAT
MDQUBESAT-2 is a 2P PocketQube launching with Alba Orbital as part of its picosat constellation for global IoT data services. It flies along with the Korean 425 Project Flight 1 by SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket on Friday
Lynk Towers 5 and 6 on a SpaceX November 2023 launch. Once Lynk Towers 5 and 6 have launched and begun operations, Lynk will be operating five of its ten satellites
Kongsberg Satellite Services AS (“KSAT”) will provide launch and early downlink operation support for the RapidEO satellite, which will be operated by L3Harris Technologies Inc. on behalf of a U.S. government classified program.
Kanazawa University’s micro small satellite “KOYOH” is selected by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency - JAXA - as its Innovative Satellite Technology Demonstration-3, will be launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket along with the Korean 425 Project Flight 1
ENSO is a radio amateur satellite/mission by University Space Center of Montpellier
ROBUSTA 1E will be deployed from ISISpace's deployer.
The rocket launch
A typical Starlink mission begins with the countdown that has a traditional 35-minute long propellant load sequence which begins with RP-1 (a refined form of kerosene) loading on both stages and liquid oxygen (LOX) loading on the first stage only.
Loading of RP-1 on the second stage wraps up first at the T-20 minute mark followed by the usual “T-20 minute vent” as the oxygen purging begins on the pipelines of the Falcon 9 Transporter/Erector (T/E) that supplies fluids and power to the vehicle. LOX load on the second stage begins about four minutes after that at T-16 minutes.
Engine chill commences at the T-7 minute mark with a small flow of LOX going into the turbopumps on all nine Merlin engines on the first stage. RP-1 loading on the booster then wraps up about a minute later at the T-6 minute mark.
LOX load on the first and second stages ends at around the T-3 minute and T-2 minute mark respectively, and the rocket takes control of the countdown at the T-1 minute mark.
Engine ignition is commanded at T-3 seconds allowing them to achieve maximum thrust and pass final checks before committing to launch and if engine checks look correct, the ground clamps release the rocket for liftoff at the expected T0 time.
After liftoff, Falcon 9 climbs away from the launch site, pitching downrange as it maneuvers along its pre-programmed trajectory. Approximately 72 seconds into the flight, the vehicle passes through Max-Q — the point of maximum dynamic pressure, where mechanical stresses on the rocket are the greatest.
The nine first-stage engines continue to power Falcon 9 for the first two minutes and 30 seconds of the mission, until the time of main engine cutoff (MECO), at which point all nine engines shut down nearly simultaneously.
Stage separation normally occurs 3-4 seconds later, with the ignition of the second stage’s Merlin Vacuum engine coming about seven seconds after staging.
While the second stage continues onward to orbit with its payload, the first stage coasts upward to apogee — the highest point of its trajectory — before beginning its trip back to Earth. The booster refines its course toward the landing zone before attempting to softly touch down on the deck of one of SpaceX’s three drone ships.
Two or three burns are required to secure the safe return and landing of a Falcon 9 booster depending on the chosen landing site. A boost back burn nullifies the horizontal speed from about 6500 km/h plus to a 2000 km/h negative if a return to launch site is chosen.
Normally a free fall trajectory is chosen which requires a re-entry burn designed to break the speed into the denser atmosphere. The Merlin 1D# engines start in a 1-3-1 sequence with the center engine 9 starting 4 seconds before lighting up engine 1 and 5 in a burn lasting 14-16 seconds ending with a 2 second center engine solo burn.
The re-entry burn last 20-22 seconds and the booster is now falling and steering through the denser atmosphere with the 6x8 feet grid fins. A last landing burn performed by the Merlin 1D# center engine is timed to the last millisecond securing the aiming and breaking of the boosters speed. Booster landings have been performed over 250 times.
Using a drone ship for booster recovery allows SpaceX to launch more mass in a payload on Falcon 9 than it would be able to launch on a return-to-launch-site mission.
In the meantime, the second stage carries on with the primary mission. After stage separation and Merlin Vacuum engine ignition, the payload fairing halves are jettisoned, thereby exposing the satellites to space.
Much akin to the Falcon 9 first stage, the fairing halves can be recovered and reused, using a system of thrusters and parachutes to make a controlled descent into the ocean where they will be picked up by a recovery vessel.
Second-stage engine cutoff (SECO-1) takes place just over eight and a half minutes into the flight. Other engine burns to modify or circulize the deployment orbit will follow if the mission requires it, such as on this military mission which used a second burn before deploying the 425 Project Flight 1 satellite.
After spacecraft separation, the second stage will, if it’s still in low earth orbit, perform a deorbit burn for proper disposal, ensuring that reentry takes place in the south Pacific or Indian Ocean.
When the second stage comes in contact with ground control station in either Hawthorne, California or Boca Chica, Texas after one orbit. The deorbit burn and a blow out command is given simultaneously to brake and empty the propellant tanks. 40-45 minutes later the second stage re-enters and crashes into the Ocean.
The rocket vehicle
The Falcon 9 Block 5 is SpaceX’s partially reusable two-stage medium-lift launch vehicle. The vehicle consists of a reusable first stage, an expendable second stage, and, when in payload configuration, a pair of reusable fairing halves.
The Falcon 9 first stage contains 9 Merlin 1D# sea level engines. Each engine uses an open gas generator cycle and runs on RP-1 and liquid oxygen (LOx). Each engine produces 845 kN of thrust at sea level, with a specific impulse (ISP) of 285 seconds, and 934 kN in a vacuum with an ISP of 313 seconds.
Due to the powerful nature of the engine, and the large amount of them, the Falcon 9 first stage is able to lose an engine right off the pad, or up to two later in flight, and be able to successfully place the payload into orbit.
The Merlin engines are ignited by triethylaluminum and triethylborane (TEA-TEB), which instantaneously burst into flames when mixed in the presence of oxygen. During static fire and launch the TEA-TEB is provided by the ground service equipment. However, as the Falcon 9 first stage is able to propulsively land, three of the Merlin engines (E1, E5, and E9) contain TEA-TEB canisters to relight for the boost back, reentry, and landing burns.
The Falcon 9 second stage is the only expendable part of the Falcon 9. It contains a singular MVacD engine that produces 992 kN of thrust and an ISP of 348 seconds. The Falcon 9 can put some or many payloads in different orbits on missions with many burns and/or long coasts between burns, the second stage is able to be equipped with a mission extension package.
When the second stage has this mission extension package it has a gray strip, which helps keep the RP-1 warm in sunlight, an increased number of composite-overwrapped pressure vessels (COPVs) for pressurization control, and additional TEA-TEB.
SpaceX is the first entity ever that recovers and reflies its fairings. After being jettisoned, the two fairing halves will use cold gas thrusters to orientate themselves as they descend through the atmosphere. Once at a lower altitude, they will deploy drogue chutes and parafoils to help them glide down to a soft landing for recovery.
The Falcon 9’s fairing consists of two dissimilar reusable halves. The first half (the half that faces away from the transport erector) is called the active half, and houses the pneumatics for the separation system. The other fairing half is called the passive half.
Comparison of Type 1 and 2 with measurements based on pixels - Type 2 are 5-6 inches thicker
As the name implies, this half plays a purely passive role in the fairing separation process, as it relies on the pneumatics from the active half.
SpaceX used boats with giant suspended nets to attempt to catch the fairing halves, however, at the end of 2020 this program was canceled due to safety risks and a low success rate. On 425 Project Flight 1, SpaceX will attempt to recover the fairing halves from the water with the recovery vessel Go Beyond.
There are three known types of 34 x 17 foot fairings used by SpaceX to protect payload during ascent through the atmosphere. The first type had 10 evenly spaced ventilation ports in a circle on the bottom part of the fairings. This type was not aerodynamic enough to carry a parachute and ACS - Attitude Control System.
The aerodynamic balance during descent must have made them prone to stalling, or they burned up too easily. ACS gas tanks, flight orientation computers and ACS thrusters must have helped with these problems during development of type 2 fairings.
The second type is a slightly thicker fairing with only 8 evenly spaced ventilation ports in a circle on the bottom part of the fairings. The ventilation ports release the pressurized Nitrox gas during ascent, but let seawater in which makes it harder to refurbish the fairings after recovery from the ocean.
In 2021, SpaceX started flying a new “upgraded” version of the Falcon 9 fairing. The third type has 8 ventilation ports in pair’s near the edge of the fairings.
Some old type 2 fairings have been rebuilt and reused in Starlink launches. That have been a test program to develop the type 3 fairings to prevent saltwater from the ocean from flooding and sinking the fairing, and makes refurbishment toward the next flight easier.
Lately it’s apparent that the fairings are actively aiming for the droneship in order to speed up the recovery process and cut corners of the time table. The fairings are breaking their speed during reentry and before deploying the parachute at altitude or the last moment.
Another solution is a ‘vertical’ boost lifting the fairings apogee so the ballistic trajectory is changed aiming for a landing nearer the droneship. It’s equivalent to raising the angle on a water hose giving the water stream an higher arc but giving it a shorter reach.
It’s not clear whether or not the cold gas nitrogen thrusters alone are capable of doing a ‘boost back’ or a ‘push up’ so the fairings can alter their forward momentum mid-flight. Every landing within 50 km of the ASDS seems to be an aimed fairing landing.
The mission won’t be utilizing this ‘push up’ fairing recovery program, which seems not to be in use anymore due to the danger of a wayward fairing half landing to close.
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