The members of the International Space Station will have to wait a bit longer for their supplies to arrive, following the latest SpaceX mission failure. The rocket tasked with transporting the cargo exploded less than 3 minutes into flight on Sunday.
The unmanned rocket blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida carrying over 5,000 pounds of space station cargo, including basic supplies such as food and a water filtration system, along with specialized equipment, namely the first docking port designed for future commercial crew capsules.
Two-and-a-half minutes into flight, as the Falcon 9 reached about 27 miles above the earth, racing at 2,900 mph, the rocket exploded in a fiery ball. The remnants of the craft were scattered over the Atlantic.
"We appear to have had a launch failure," announced NASA commentator, George Diller, as a captivated audience watched live coverage.
Fortunately, NASA reports that the three crew members aboard the ISS have plenty of supplies to last them several months. But it's little consolation for the valuable equipment that was lost in the explosion, all of which will have to be replaced.
"We're good from a food and water standpoint," NASA's top spaceflight official, William Gerstenmair said at a press conference.
According to SpaceX founder and chief executive, Elon Musk, the explosion was the result of elevated pressure in the liquid-oxygen tank, which is a component of the rocket's upper stage.
"That's all we can say with confidence right now," Musk announced via Twitter. Investigations continue as to what caused the rise in pressure.
But SpaceX representatives reassured the public. The Dragon capsule, which was aboard the Falcon rocket and is slated to carry the humans to the ISS in the near future, continued to send signals to the ground after the rocket fell to earth. And according to Gwynne Shotwell, president of SpaceX, had live crew members been aboard yesterday's flight, the abort system would have ejected them to safety.
The last failed launch, which occurred in May, was designed to test the emergency abort system of the Dragon capsule, but it too exploded shortly after takeoff. This is the third failed mission in a row for SpaceX.
"This is a blow to us," Gerstenmaier said, as he reminded the public how difficult and complex space travel remains.
SpaceX aims to send astronauts aboard the Falcon-Dragon to the ISS by December 2017 and Shotwell assured the media that they would remain on target "and get back to flight."
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