As Blue Origin Gets the Spotlight, SpaceX Plans Its Next Flight

The private space company Blue Origin made history Tuesday when it announced it successfully launched and recovered its New Shepard rocket after reaching what is technically "space."

But while everyone was congratulating Blue Origin and its owner, Jeff Bezos, the CEO of its competitor SpaceX, which has also been racing to successfully land a rocket, was sulking.

"Congrats to Jeff Bezos and the BO team for achieving VTOL on their booster," Elon Musk tweeted. "It is, however, important to clear up the difference between 'space' and 'orbit.'"

Jeff maybe unaware SpaceX suborbital VTOL flight began 2013. Orbital water landing 2014. Orbital land landing next. https://t.co/S6WMRnEFY5
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 24, 2015

It's not an easy time for Musk and SpaceX. The last time SpaceX attempted to launch was June, and its rocket exploded three minutes into a flight to the International Space Station, breaking the company's spotless track record.

It's now gearing up for its next mission, a delivery of 11 mini satellites for Orbcomm, Inc. that will be placed in low-Earth orbit, expected sometime in December. A triumphant announcement from one of its competitors just ahead of the launch can't have been heartening.

Musk is right, however. Not to take anything away from Blue Origin, as it is rightfully celebrating a tremendous achievement, but its rocket didn't have to go very far into space. By contrast, SpaceX's Falcon 9—the craft that will fly the mission for Orbcomm—is a larger, heavier vehicle that is designed for orbital flight, meaning it will be traveling much faster thus making any landing attempts more involved and technically difficult.

Now on its comeback tour, SpaceX chose the OrbComm mission for a reason. Originally the SES-9 satellite, destined for a orbital parking spot 22,000 miles above the Earth, was next on the launch manifest. The companies agreed to switch schedules, however, allowing SpaceX to fly a simpler mission first: the Orbcomm satellites are destined to be deployed 400 miles above the Earth, requiring only one burn of the Falcon's second stage engine instead of two. By flying Orbcomm first, SpaceX plans to carry-out an on orbit test of the second stage relight system by firing it up after the payload has been deployed. The test will allow engineers to check out and optimize the relight system prior to the SES mission.

During the Orbcomm mission, SpaceX will also attempt an ocean landing and recovery of the first stage. SpaceX built two floating landing platforms, officially dubbed autonomous spaceport drone ships (ASDS), and named them "Just Read The Instructions" and "Of Course I Still Love You" as a hat tip to science fiction writer Iain M. Banks.

"The ASDS is about the size of a football field, and from the ground that looks very large, but from space, it's actually very small," said Hans Koenigsmann, VP of mission assurance at SpaceX. "The landing sequence happens very quickly. Within ten minutes of liftoff, the first stage will have landed (or not) on the ASDS."

Koenigsmann went on to explain the landing process. "After first stage separation, cold gas thrusters flip the rocket, before three engines reignite for the first of a series of burns," he said. "This brief burn, called a boostback burn, ensures the rocket is in line with the landing site. Next, a set of grid fins will deploy, helping to steer the rocket. Then the engines will relight a second time, slowing the rocket down further. One final engine reignition is needed, along with the thrusters and grid fins, to slow and steer the vehicle so (hopefully) it will touch down in one piece on the drone ship."

During the first landing attempt, the grid fins ran out of hydraulic fuel and were unable to slow and steer the rocket. A larger fuel reserve was added for more control. The second attempt went almost as planned, except for a thrust valve controlling the rocket's speed was stuck on high, keeping the engine firing for a few seconds longer than intended. When a vehicle weighing 67,000 pounds and traveling at speeds of 200 mph, a few seconds make all the difference.

It must have hurt when Blue Origin stuck its landing so soon after SpaceX's disastrous June launch. Pulling off the tricky ocean landing, however, will be enough for SpaceX to eclipse its competitor's victory.