Starlink Mission

[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] lw01 weathernet liftoff conditions pretty good the sts is ready for launch ignition liftoff falcon 9 has cleared the tower [Music] ten nine eight side booster ignition six five four three two one [Music] good evening it's thursday december 2nd and you're looking at a live view of falcon 9 as it awaits its 6 12 p.m eastern time launch from space launch complex 40 at cape canaveral space force station my name is andy tran i'm a quality engineer here at spacex joining you from our headquarters in hawthorne california thank you for tuning in for our 18th launch of starlink this year and spacex's 27th mission of 2021. starlink is a satellite internet constellation designed and manufactured by spacex that can provide high-speed low-latency internet to people living in remote and rural locations around the globe today's launch will be our fourth rideshare mission of the year this launch will be a longer one as we are reverting to a circular orbital insertion which requires two burns of the merlin vacuum engine on the second stage we are doing this as it is a mission requirement for our rideshare customer flying on board tonight inside the fairing at the top of the rocket there are 48 starling satellites and two black sky satellites black sky is a global monitoring company that combines space assets with advanced ai and machine learning analysis to provide customers a first to know advantage i'll share a few more details about these payloads a bit later in the webcast as for the 48 starling satellites they will be inserted into low earth orbit and bring us one step closer to near global coverage of the populated world in 2021 the latest weather forecast shows about 90 favorable chance of liftoff today the vehicle the satellites and range are all looking good to support an on-time liftoff just over 11 minutes from now let's take a closer look at the rocket that you see on screen falcon 9 our two-stage launch vehicle stands about 70 meters tall and when it's fully fueled it'll hold just over 1 million pounds of per pound that the vehicle will burn through in less than three minutes after liftoff we prep falcon 9 for launch in our hangar at the base of the pad upon completing final checkouts falcon 9 rolled out to the pad with the starlink and black sky payloads and went vertical on monday around 5 pm eastern time from there we had successful static fire of our nine merlin 1d engines on the first stage yesterday the bottom two thirds of the vehicle is what we refer to as the first stage you may be able to see the sit markings left over from this booster's previous eight flights supporting the gps three three mission turks at 5a transporter 2 and 5 previous starlink missions the first stage accelerates the vehicle through the earth's atmosphere into space with the help of nine merlin engines at the base of the rocket following separation from the second stage we'll be attempting to recover our first stage for a ninth time on our drone ship a shortfall of gravitas staged off the coast of florida in the atlantic ocean you can see it on screen right now if successful it will make the 89th recovery of a falcon 9 first stage and 96 total first stage landings if you include our falcon heavy booster recoveries on top of the first stage is the black carbon fiber inner stage and then on top of that is the falcon 9 second stage which has a single merlin vacuum or mvac engine once the first and second stages separate at about two and a half minutes into the mission the mvac engine will ignite and carry the starlink satellites and two black sky satellites to a low earth orbit around the earth the stack of satellites is safely enclosed inside of the 17 foot diameter payload fairing which you see on screen right now this protects the payload from aerothermal loads heating and contamination during ascent once we reach the vacuum of space we will jettison the fairing as the second stage continue it continues its journey to orbit just as we reuse the falcon 9 we recover and we use our fairing halves as well the fairing halves we're using today are brand new and we're going to be attempting to recover these halves using our recovery vessel bob propellants have been loading on the vehicle since the t minus 35 minute mark falcon 9 is a bi-propellant vehicle which means it uses two propellants a fuel and an oxidizer an oxidizer is a type of chemical that a fuel requires in order to burn most things here on earth burn using oxygen which is readily available in the earth's atmosphere but in space there is no atmosphere to provide oxygen or other oxidizers so the rocket needs to carry up their own in falcon 9's case it's super chilled liquid oxygen called lox the liquid oxygen is chilled well below its boiling point so that it can become what we call densified which means it has a much greater amount of mass per volume and we can load more of it onto the booster for fuel we use a refined form of kerosene known as rp-1 in addition to its propellants falcon 9 also needs an ignition source in order to go and for that we use the chemical t-tab or triethyl aluminum and triethyl borane currently fuel is nearly fully loaded on the first stage and starting to load on the second stage once all tanks are full both stages will continue to be topped off with propellant until about the t minus two minute mark to keep temperatures as cold as possible again weather is looking fantastic for tonight's liftoff uh the vehicle and satellites in the fairing they are uh remaining good as well uh we are targeting an on time liftoff just under seven and a half minutes from now and as i mentioned earlier today's mission marks the fourth official mission under spacex's smallsat rideshare program this year which gives small satellites flexible access to what is now the most flown operational rocket in the united states the falcon 9. tonight we're flying 48 starlink satellites to make room for two black sky payloads from our customers space flight in an effort to make to help black sky rapidly expand its growing constellation of high revisit satellites spaceflight incorporated is managing the launch of these two additional black sky high resolution multi-spectral gen 2 satellites to low earth orbit expanding black skies network in space and offering of real-time geospatial intelligence and monitoring services black sky combines high-resolution images captured by its constellation of microsatellites with its proprietary artificial intelligence software to deliver analytics and insights to industries including transportation infrastructure land use defense supply chain management and humanitarian aid so far this year we've launched over 200 rideshare payloads to orbit this includes the ones launched on the transporter 1 mission in january a previous starlink launch in may and the transporter 2 mission in june after this mission our next riotous mission is scheduled to launch at the beginning of next year and that's going to be transporter 3 which will be a dedicated rideshare launch to sun synchronous orbit as part of our smallsat rideshare program we offer three dedicated rideshare missions two sun synchronous orbits per year as well as launch opportunities on our sonic missions with like what you're seeing here today so we are about five and a half minutes from liftoff of our 18th starlink launch of 2021 and the falcon 9 is progressing into the final stages of the countdown next up the truss structure next to the vehicle known as the transporter erector we also refer to it as the te it will begin to start to retract away from the falcon 9 vehicle in preparation for retracting the te clamp arms will open up and then the transport erector will begin to pull away from the rocket slightly to its pre-launch position about two degrees from the vehicle then at t0 hydraulics pull the t even further away from falcon 9 as it lifts off the transport erector is also the structure that provides liquids gases electrical connections to the second stage as well as air conditioning to the payload fairing and the vehicle is continuing to load propellant once we're fully topped off we'll have over one million pounds of kerosene fuel and liquid oxygen on screen right now is a view of the fairing right beneath the fairing those are the clamp arms that we are expecting to open up and here they go once these clamp arms open up you should start to see the trust structure begin to recline away from falcon 9 in preparation for liftoff again we are continuing to load propellant on both the stages the first and second stages should finish loading propellant about a minute apart from one another the first stage finishing up around the t minus three minute mark and the second stage finishing up around the t minus two minute mark at t minus 60 seconds falcon 9 will be in startup this means that the rockets autonomous internal flight computers have taken over the launch countdown and just inside t minus two seconds we light the merlin 1d engines and then we're set for liftoff the starlink payload and the black sky payloads inside the fairing continue to be healthy the falcon 9 team is tracking no issues at this time so we're starting to hear some hissing and popping this is a venting from our lox lines as part of the transporter erectors uh job to continue to fill the the vehicle with propellant we can also start to see some white clouds forming around the falcon 9 this will become more and more prominent as we get closer to t0 this is just that super cold liquid oxygen starting to densify and form those clouds that you start to see when it meets the warmer ambient air temperatures of florida so again we have a pretty much perfect weather in florida for today's liftoff attempt this is a rideshare mission carrying 48 starlink satellites as well as two black sky satellites enclosed in the fairing that you see on screen right now [Applause] and there goes those pissing and hopping that is normal and expected at this stage in the countdown this point the propellant has been fully loaded on the vehicle and we are just under a minute away both stages should be beginning to pressurize for liftoff so we are 40 seconds away let's listen into terminal count as we prepare for liftoff of the 48 starling satellites and the two black sky sidelines t-minus 30 seconds and counting t-minus 15 seconds of counting [Applause] t minus five four three two one zero ignition liftoff up nominal power in telemetry so we are about a minute into liftoff falcon 9 has successfully lifted off from space launch complex 40 at cape canaveral station in just a few seconds here we are expecting the call out for max q that is the period where the vehicle experienced the highest amount of aerodynamic pressures max q and there was the call out so now that we've gone uh past the period of high stresses on the vehicle we have three events happening in quick succession in about a minute first we have a main engine cutoff also referred to as miko then stage separation followed by second engine start one also known as ses1 main engine cutoff is where all nine merlin engines on the first stage will shut down to slow the vehicle down in preparation for stage separation during stage separation the first and second stage will separate from one another the first stage will make its way back to earth for landing while the second stage continues its journey with our satellites uh with the third event which is a second engine start one the single merlin vacuum engine on the second stage will then ignite and continue to propel those um starlink satellites and black sky satellites into orbit eco stage separation confirmed so you can see on screen we had successful main engine cutoff followed by stage separation and on the right hand side of the screen that is the single merlin vacuum engine blowing red hot on the left hand side of the screen is the view of our first stage i think we're getting some views of the of twilight right now as the sun has just set uh in the east coast in a few seconds we are expecting fairing deploy and that will expose the satellites to the vacuum of space pairing separation we got the audio and video confirmation on the right hand side of the screen the fairing halves have deployed we are going to attempt to recover those uh using our recovery vessel bob later on in the mission uh for now the uh mission is going great again the left-hand side is a view from the top of our first stage looking downward you can see little plumes of gas coming out that is nitrogen uh for our as part of our attitude control system to help orient the the first stage booster properly as it makes its way back to attempt its ninth landing on our drone ship in the atlantic ocean uh right-hand side is a view of the second stage merlin vacuum engine the uh 48 starling satellites and the two black sky satellites that we had mentioned earlier acquisition on the opposite end of that engine and so again they are going to be in this burn for another couple of minutes as they continue to make their way to low earth orbit so in order to make its way back to the drone ship the first stage needs to execute two burns the first is an entry burn where three of the merlin 1d engines uh will ignite this helps to slow the stage down as it reenters the upper parts of the earth's atmosphere the second burn is the landing burn this is a single engine burn and this will bring the vehicle speed down rapidly in order to land on our drone ship trajectory nominal that first burn the entry burn is expected to start around t plus 6 minutes and 22 seconds and last for about 20 seconds for those that are just joining us we are in the middle of spacex's 27th mission of 2021 both stages have separated we did have a successful liftoff from space launch complex 40. things are continuing to go well for tonight's mission so we are about 20 seconds away from the beginning of that entry burn on the first stage we do have camera views right now it is a little dark but as soon as that entry burn starts we should see that first stage um being lit up as it will slow itself down before hitting the denser parts of their earth's atmosphere stage one enterprise startup one flight termination system is safe all right three engines have relit on the first stage if you're keeping track the bottom left-hand side of the screen there is a speedometer of sorts that is tracking the velocity of the first stage you can see that we're starting to reduce that velocity if you keep an eye on that as soon as the first stage hits the denser parts of the atmosphere will continue to slow down its speed in preparation for the next burn the landing burn and that landing burn is expected to happen a few seconds after the t plus eight minute mark trajectory nominal the mvac engine performance on the second stage continues to go well a few seconds after we complete the landing burn we are expecting to turn off this engine and enter a coast phase and as a reminder we will be reigniting this engine about 50 minutes from now stage one london burn there's the call out the landing burn has begun terminal guidance in just a few seconds here we're going to see if we can land this first stage booster for the ninth time [Applause] stage one london leg deploy you can hear the cheer and the pause and there's the visual this first stage booster has landed nine times this marks our 89th overall successful recovery of a 2009 first stage and the and twenty nine successful fights of a falcon 9 first stage so what we're waiting on now is confirmation of second engine cutoff insertion confirmation of a good orbital insertion as i was speaking we did get that confirmation um so the second stage uh with all of its satellites are entering a coast phase for about 50 minutes we're going to leave you with some space tunes and we'll be back here at the t-plus 59-minute mark [Music] [Music] acquisition of signal newfoundland [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] so [Music] expected loss of signal bermuda [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] uh [Music] so [Music] [Music] okay [Music] [Music] [Music] expected loss of signal newfoundland [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] acquisition [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] expected loss of signal good healing [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] 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[Applause] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] and satellite [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] welcome back if you are just joining us if you're just joining us a quick recap of today's mission we had successful lifting from cape canaveral space force station at 6 12 p.m eastern time we then had successful stage separation we covered our first stage after its ninth flight on our drone ship a shortfall of gravitas and had a successful second stage mvc engine burn we are now waiting on the second relight of the second stage uh merlin vacuum engine and this burn should last just a few seconds and back ignition deco 2. so we just saw that very very short clip there the merlin vacuum engine on the second stage ignited for a few seconds then we also got confirmation of a good second engine cut off so we are waiting on confirmation of a good orbit on the second stage we are not all orbit stars a few minutes away from the first payload deploy and we did hear the confirmation of good orbital insertion that was a spectacular shot of the second stage with the earth in the background what the second stage does at deployment is actually largely determined by customer requirements and make sure that the payloads don't run into each other for this particular mission we have two rideshare payloads in addition to the starlink satellite stack the rideshare payloads are deployed while the stage is not spinning here they are on screen by contrast the starling stack is always deployed while spinning the uh will actually spin at a rate at about three degrees per second this creates a small difference in velocity between the individual starling satellites allowing them to separate over time so again we are about two and a half minutes away from the first black sky satellite from deployment from deploying again we do have two of them on on board today and they'll be deploying about three minutes apart from one another and this shot right here um you can start to see the starlink stacks um some interesting notes about the starlink each of those satellites are about 500 pounds um we when we deploy them we'll deploy them into low earth orbit but then over the next couple of days and weeks they'll actually fire their onboard thrusters to get to their final operational orbit um the starling satellites operate at about 550 kilometers in altitude and by contrast the international space station is orbiting the earth at about 400 kilometers so these startling stacks are operating a little bit higher than the international space station so again we are waiting on the first deployment of the black sky satellite it's going to happen about a minute from now is the first of three payload deployments our first and second payloads are again are about three minutes apart black sky is a global monitoring company that combines space assets with advanced ai and machine learning analysis to provide customers a first to know advantage for now as we wait we are enjoying some awesome views of the second stage space and the earth and as we continue to orbit around the earth we are trying to connect to ground stations here on the floor and so we'll periodically lose some signals but um you can see that uh we're trying to get the signals back and the video footage back as much as possible as we hopefully can see the black sky satellites deploying from the top of the second stage level 12 payload deploy confirmed so we did get audio confirmation i am looking on screen right now to see if we can see it visually again the two black sky satellites are actually positioned at the top of the stack and so the the uh objects if you will that are closest to the screen those are the starling satellites so uh we didn't quite get the visual confirmation of the first satellite maybe we'll get the second one but again we are about three minutes away from the second deployment of the black sky satellite that one interesting thing to note as we continue to get this view here is in space and and maybe without a point of reference things seem to look very very stagnant um if you look at the bottom right hand side of your screen we are actually traveling at 26 000 kilometers an hour around the earth and this is really to um this is close to orbital velocity but at those speeds you could pretty much travel end to end from america in about 10 minutes so even though it doesn't look like we're moving very very quickly the second stage and the satellites are indeed zipping around the earth so right now the second stage is actually uh just a little bit south and east of australia it's continuing to head east and we are about a minute away from the second black sky satellite deployment for those that are just joining we did have successful deployment of our first black sky satellite this is the fourth rideshare mission of 2021 for us here at spacex and the 27th mission overall just about 15 seconds away from our expected deployment of the second and final black sky satellite [Music] global 13 payload deploy confirmed and that is great news we've now successfully deployed the two black sky satellites on behalf of our customer space flight we are wishing them bon vourage to the two black sky sats and it was our pleasure to give you a lift today with that we are awaiting the deployment of our 48 starling satellites which is scheduled to occur about 20 minutes from now at the time of the of the deployment we won't actually have ground station coverage but will return just before we require signal to the south texas station about t plus one hour and 32 minutes to get confirmation of that deployment we will see you back here in just a few moments [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] expected loss of signal tasmania 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stage separation we saw second engine start and second engine cut off successfully twice on the second stage we were also able to land our first stage booster for the ninth time on our drone ship a shortfall of gravitas and then about 20 minutes ago we successfully deployed the two black sky satellites we were expecting the starlink satellites to deploy around the t-plus one hour and 29 minute mark and at that time we didn't have ground station coverage so right now we should be coming in the range of south texas ground station and getting confirmation of the starlink satellites deploying so i am hearing that we did indeed get confirmation of those 48 starling satellites deploying um that is the 34th launch of starlink to date which means that we've launched nearly 2 000 starlight satellites thus far with that said all the payloads on today's missions on today's mission have reached their intended orbit for now we will be bringing our webcast to an end would like to thank the range and federal aviation administration for supporting today's mission and to our customer space flight and of course thank you to all of our viewers and all of our starling customers using our service at this time if you are interested in signing up for starlink service head over to starlink.com thank you again for watching and we will see you next time [Music] you

Channel: SpaceX

Views: 584,345

Keywords: SpaceX, Space, Musk, Satellite, NROl-108, Mission

Id: 594TbXriaAk

Length: 109min 0sec (6540 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 03 2021