SpaceX Dragon capsule returns from International Space Station

By Irene Klotz

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - A Space Exploration Technologies' Dragon cargo capsule splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on Tuesday, bringing back science experiments and gear from the International Space Station.

The spacecraft left the orbital outpost at 6:56 a.m. ET, and parachuted into the ocean about 225 miles west of Mexico's Baja California at 12:34 p.m. ET.

"Recovery ship just heard the sonic booms from Dragon re-entry and has data transmission lock," Elon Musk, founder and chief executive of the privately held company known as SpaceX, wrote on Twitter just before splashdown.

A minute later, recovery ship personnel reported seeing Dragon's parachutes, Musk said.

"Recovery ship has secured Dragon," Musk wrote. "Cargo looks A-OK."

The ship will take the capsule to the Port of Los Angeles, near the company's Hawthorne, California, headquarters, a journey expected to take about 30 hours.

Dragon's return began 252 miles above Earth when astronauts aboard the station used a robotic crane to pluck the capsule from its berthing port and set it into orbit.

SpaceX flight controllers then stepped in and remotely commanded Dragon to fire its steering thrusters and begin the 5.5-hour journey home.

"It looks beautiful from here," station flight engineer Thomas Marshburn radioed to Mission Control in Houston as the capsule flew away.

"Sad to see the Dragon go. Performed her job beautifully, heading back to her lair. Wish her all the best for the splashdown today," Marshburn said.

The Dragon cargo ship reached the station on March 3 with more than 2,300 pounds (1,043 kg) of science equipment, spare parts, food and supplies. It was the second of 12 planned cargo runs for NASA under a $1.6 billion contract. A second freighter, built and operated by Orbital Sciences Corp, is expected to debut this year.

The U.S. space agency hired both firms to fill the gap left by the retirement of its space shuttle fleet in 2011.

Dragon's arrival was delayed a day while SpaceX engineers grappled with a thruster pod problem that had threatened to derail the mission.

"I don't want to go through that again. That was hard-core," Musk said during a keynote speech at the South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, earlier this month.

PRECISION RENDEZVOUS

Engineers believe the glitch was caused by a blockage in a pressurization line or a stuck valve. It was cleared and the capsule made a precision rendezvous with the station with no problems. An investigation remains under way, said company spokeswoman Christina Ra.

Dragon returned to Earth with 2,668 (1,210 kg) of cargo, including a freezer filled with biological samples from the crew for medical research.

While Russian, European and Japanese freighters also service the station, only the SpaceX vessel is designed to return cargo to Earth, a critical transportation link that had been lost with the retirement of the shuttles.

SpaceX is working to upgrade the Dragon capsule to fly people as well. A test flight with company astronauts is targeted for 2016.

In addition to enhancing the Dragon capsules, SpaceX is working on an upgraded Falcon 9 rocket. Last week, the rocket's new Merlin engines completed a 28th and final test run, certifying it for flight, Ra said.

The company plans to debut its upgraded Falcon 9 rocket on a science satellite-delivery mission for the Canadian Space Agency in June.

That rocket also will be the first flight from SpaceX's new launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Five previous Falcon 9 flights have launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Dragon's return initially was scheduled for Monday, but it was docked an extra day because of high seas in the Pacific.

Meanwhile, Orbital Sciences Corp, which holds an eight-flight, $1.9 billion NASA contract for station resupply flights, plans to test launch its new Antares rocket as early as April 16 from the commercial Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.

Orbital's Cygnus cargo capsule is targeted to make a demonstration run to the space station later in the year.

(Editing by Vicki Allen)

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Private SpaceX Capsule Brings Big Science to Space Station

The International Space Station is now home to more than 1,200 pounds (544 kilograms) of supplies delivered by an unmanned, privately built space capsule that reached the orbiting science laboratory on Sunday (March 3).

Among the goods SpaceX's Dragon capsule transported to the station were science experiments primed and ready for the six international residents of the space station.

"Dragon is scheduled to return to Earth on March 25, bringing home nearly double the amount of supplies it brought up, about 2,668 pounds (1,210 kilograms)," NASA officials said in a statement. "Returning investigation samples will demonstrate how life in microgravity affects the growth of plant seedlings, changes to the human body, the behavior of semiconductors and detergents, and more."

Some of the experiments will only stay on board for three weeks, making a round trip back to Earth with Dragon when the capsule detaches from the station. One of those experiments involves thale cress, a plant used in many experiments because of its small, relatively easy-to-map genome.

Scientists affiliated with NASA and the European Space Agency sent up one experiment called "Seedling Growth-1," designed to investigate how well plants grow amid stresses such as low oxygen. [See video of SpaceX's Dragon docking in orbit]

"The experiment will study how plants adapt to micro- and low-gravity environments," NASA officials wrote in a statement. "Researchers hope to determine the ability of vegetation to provide a complete, sustainable, dependable and economical means for human life-support in space."

Beyond helping scientists learn how to grow food in space, the research might contribute to better agricultural practices back on Earth. Understanding how these plants react to a stressful environment could lend insight into how farmers could mitigate those taxing situations back on the planet's surface.

Some of the experiments sent to the International Space Station will play a role in education, as well.

"Students from several California schools developed investigations to study bacteria, iron corrosion, battery performance and carbon dioxide levels aboard the station, all of which will be delivered by Dragon," NASA officials wrote in a statement.

Personal product manufacturer Procter & Gamble sent up another experiment that will study how to better preserve toothpaste, gels and creams.

"Particle additives can make a product last longer by maintaining its consistency, but they sink and clump together after a certain amount of time, which can spoil a product," NASA officials said. "It's difficult to study these dynamics on Earth because gravity gets in the way, making the space station an ideal research platform for these important industrial processes."

Although Dragon's launch went flawlessly, once the capsule parted from the Falcon 9 rocket used to boost it into orbit, one glitch became apparent. A thruster problem delayed Dragon's approach to the space station by a day. The spacecraft is expected to return to Earth with experiment results and other gear on March 25.

Dragon also brought a few treats for the astronauts, with bananas and apples among the first items unloaded to the space station.

Follow Miriam Kramer @mirikramer and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. This article was first published on SPACE.com.

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SpaceX Sues Expert Who Questioned Safety of Private Falcon 9 Rocket (SPACE.com)

WASHINGTON — Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is suing Herndon, Va.-based Valador Inc. and its vice president, Joe Fragola, for making what SpaceX says were defamatory allegations about the safety and reliability of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.

At the heart of the lawsuit is a June 8 email Fragola allegedly sent to NASA’s chief of safety and mission assurance, Bryan D. O’Connor, saying he was trying to verify a rumor that the Falcon 9’s first stage experienced a significant anomaly during its December launch of the Dragon space capsule. The suit was filed June 14 in Virginia’s Fairfax County Circuit Court.

"I have just heard a rumor, and I am trying now to check its veracity, that the Falcon 9 experienced a double engine failure in the first stage and that the entire stage blew up just after the first stage separated. I also heard that this information was being held from NASA until SpaceX can 'verify' it."

SpaceX denies there were any such problems on the flight, the second of the medium-lift Falcon 9 rocket. [Photos: SpaceX's Falcon 9 Rocket]

"First, there was no ‘double-engine’ failure (nor even a single engine failure)," SpaceX says in its complaint. “As planned, two of the nine first-stage engines shut down automatically ten seconds before the first stage shut down.

"Second, the first stage did not 'blow up' after separation from the second stage and spacecraft. The launch was broadcast by a camera on the Dragon spacecraft, which vividly showed the separation of the first stage — and no explosion occurred. Furthermore, the first stage was, at all times, tracked by ground telemetry including by NASA. No systems observed any "explosion" of the first stage. As an 'expert,' Fragola should have known the notion of the first stage 'blowing up' was abjectly untrue."

O'Connor did not respond to a request for comment. Fragola, reached June 16 at Valador's Rockville Centre, New York, office, declined to comment, saying he had been advised not to talk about the case.

SpaceX also declined to discuss the case. "It’s still in the hands of counsel and we have no comment," SpaceX spokesman Bobby Block said June 17.

Fragola is a safety expert and a core member of the NASA Exploration Systems Architecture Study team that in 2005 picked the Ares 1 and Ares 5 rockets the agency then set out to build under the now-defunct Constellation program. In December 2009, Fragola testified before the House Science and Technology space and aeronautics subcommittee about ensuring safety in human spaceflight.

In its complaint, SpaceX says Fragola sought a consulting contract worth up to $1 million, claiming the company needed his independent analysis of the Falcon 9 "to bolster its reputation with NASA based on what he called an unfair ‘perception’ about SpaceX." [Video: Falcon Heavy - Most Lift Since Saturn 5]

"SpaceX subsequently learned that Fragola — within the scope of his employment at Valador, and using his email account at Valador — has been contacting officials in the United States Government to make disparaging remarks about SpaceX, which have created the very ‘perception’ that he claimed SpaceX needed his help to rectify," SpaceX’s claim states.

SpaceX also says that if anything went wrong during the flight, NASA would have known. "NASA officials were present with SpaceX controllers in the control center during the flight, and thus saw in real time all of the telemetry information SpaceX controllers saw," the complaint states. "SpaceX then provided extensive post-flight debriefings to NASA, including telemetry analysis. If any of the foregoing events claimed by Fragola had occurred, then NASA would have known as soon as SpaceX did."

Asked whether the Falcon 9 experienced any type of first-stage anomaly in its last outing, Block said: "Any observance noted had no impact on this or future mission success."

SpaceX, which holds a $1.6 billion contract to deliver supplies to the International Space Station using Falcon 9 and Dragon, is seeking at least $1 million in damages plus legal fees and is demanding that a jury hear the case.

SpaceX’s attorney in the suit, Douglas Lobel with the Cooley law firm of Reston, Va., did not respond to a request for comment.

This article was provided by Space News, dedicated to covering all aspects of the space industry.

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