Spacex aborts launch to ISS over rocket engine problem

CAPE CANAVERAL: The California-based company Spacex scrubbed the launch of its Dragon capsule toward the International Space Station at the last second due to a rocket engine problem.

The abort came a half-second before liftoff yesterday due to high pressure in the centre engine of the Falcon9 rocket, forcing a shutdown of the launch attempt. The next try is expected on Tuesday.

“This is not failure. We aborted with purpose. It would be a failure if we were to have lifted off with an engine trending in this direction,” Spacex president Gwynne Shotwell told reporters after the launch was scrubbed.

The postponement came when an engine controller noted high chamber pressure in engine five of the rocket, which requires all nine engines for a successful liftoff.

Inspectors would be searching for a root cause to the problem, she said.

A similar issue with engine five forced a temporary delay of the Falcon 9’ s first ever flight, but that lift-off was not scrubbed because there was a longer launch window and Spacex was able to recycle the attempt, Shotwell said.

However, this time there was a very narrowwindow of opportunity to launch toward the ISS so the attempt was put off.

“We will be out there looking for whatever we can find and we will put out a statement as soon as we find a root cause,” Shotwell said, adding that early indications had ruled out a sensor failure or a faulty fuel valve.

The launch of the Spacex Falcon 9 rocket, carrying the unmanned Dragon and over half a tonne of cargo toward the orbiting lab, would mark the first attempt to send a privately built spacecraft to the research outpost, where it plans to do a fly-under followed by a berthing.

Spacex is the first of several US competitors to try sending its own cargo-bearing spacecraft to the ISS with the goal of restoring US access to space for human travellers by 2015. — AFP