Spacex Falcon 1 Flight 5 Launch

[mr_mark]

Thought I would get this thread rolling on the upcoming launch for April 20th. If anyone has any information regarding payload or pics, please post here thanks.

 

[MeteorWayne]

Sorry for my confusion, this thread is now unlocked. This one is for discussions of the upcoming flight on April 20/21. There's a separate thread for the Falcon 9 test flight coming up.

Again, my apologies for getting confused.

Wayne

 

[Zipi]

MeteorWayne posted this to Falcon 9 thread, but I copy&paste this here since it gives some information about Falcon 1 flight 5:

Hawthorne, CA (March 30, 2009) – Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) announces that the launch window for ATSB's RazakSAT on Falcon 1 Flight 5, is currently scheduled to open Monday, April 20th at 4:00 p.m. (PDT) / 7:00 p.m. (EDT).

SpaceX's Falcon 1 launch site is located approximately 2500 miles southwest of Hawaii on Omelek Island, part of the Reagan Test Site (RTS) at United States Army Kwajalein Atoll (USAKA) in the Central Pacific. Due to the location of the launch site, the Kwajalein local date at the opening of the launch window will be April 21st.

RazakSAT was designed and built by Astronautic Technology (M) Sdn Bhd (ATSB), a pioneer and leader in the design and manufacture of satellites in Malaysia. The satellite will be launched aboard the Falcon 1, a two-stage, liquid oxygen/rocket-grade kerosene vehicle, designed from the ground up by SpaceX.

Falcon 1 will place RazakSAT, equipped with a high resolution Medium-Sized Aperture Camera (MAC), into a near equatorial orbit. The payload is expected to provide high resolution images of Malaysia that can be applied to land management, resource development and conservation, forestry and fish migration.

SpaceX will provide live coverage of the Falcon 1 Flight 5/RazakSAT mission via webcast at: www.SpaceX.com. The webcast will begin 20 minutes prior to launch and will include mission briefings, live feeds and launch coverage from the launch site. Post-launch, video footage and photos will be available for download on the Web site.

 

[Zipi]

You can follow the SpaceX updates from:

http://www.spacex.com/updates.php

There are some really nice pictures as well.

 

[Boris_Badenov]

There's only 9 days to go & no updates. They sure are playing their cards close on this launch.

 

[MeteorWayne]

That is their history

 

[lensman01]

Hi
Is anyone else having trouble accessing Spacex's website?
Browser just hangs, but only on their site. :?:

 

[Swampcat]

Hi
Is anyone else having trouble accessing Spacex's website?
Browser just hangs, but only on their site. :?:

No problem here. Works fine.

 

[Boris_Badenov]

Hi
Is anyone else having trouble accessing Spacex's website?
Browser just hangs, but only on their site. :?:

The link above takes a few extra seconds on my broadband connection, (it's a big page) but otherwise it works fine. Go to the home page first, it's much faster.

 

[Boris_Badenov]

I just checked the SpaceFlight Now launch schedule & they've added the time of launch. It'll be at 7pm EDT on the 20th. That'll be 5pm for me. 8 days, for me the countdown has already started. :mrgreen:

 

[mr_mark]

It could be that the Malaysian government is having something to say about publicity of the launch. This is very unlike Spacex to post so few pictures of launch preparations. Also I noticed that this is a recon satellite which is supposed to take pictures of weather and crop development. Maybe the camera is going to be taking other pictures, if you get my drift. Well it makes for a good mystery and I'm most likely wrong anyways. Bring on the pics!

 

[MeteorWayne]

That hasn't been my experience. SpaceX doesn't seem to say much until the actual launch assembly is underway, which is only a day or so before launch. I wish they would do more, but it seems they prefer not to predict, but report real time as things are happening.

 

[mr_mark]

5 days and counting for a successful launch and then on to Falcon 9 this summer. It should be a fantastic summer with 2 new rocket launches Ares 1x and Falcon 9. Talk about exciting.

 

[Zipi]

Seems that there are new updates at SpaceX page:

http://www.spacex.com/updates.php

Dated 14.04.2009

 

[docm]

In SBT's SpaceX updates thread I've posted that F1-5 has been postponed for at least 6 weeks due to a problem with the F1 launch vehicle. Link to the news item there.

 

[ThereIWas2]

And "SBT" stands for.....

 

[tanstaafl76]

The Space Business and Technology section...

viewforum.php?f=15

 

[mr_mark]

I'm seeing no actual news from other sources about the delay, possible false story :!:

 

[nimbus]

There's not that much skepticism at nasaspaceflight's forum. It's in the commercial launch sub-forum.

 

[Boris_Badenov]

I'm seeing no actual news from other sources about the delay, possible false story :!:

A quick Google search turned up several stories from Malaysian news sources. I'm afraid it's a real delay. I do hope we get something from SpaceX officially soon, though.

 

[dragon04]

Well that would certainly be disappointing.

 

[nimbus]

"Compatibility issue" because of "potential impact of predicted vehicle environments on the satellite"

 

[docm]

An as yet to be defined vibration problem. My (short) speculation in SBT.

 

[nimbus]

The sat makers made a design mistake?

 

[ThereIWas2]

Or perhaps now that they have some real flight data it turns out that the actual environment for the payload is more extreme in some way than the initial design documents specified.