And then there were two. After SpaceX launched Starlink 4-14 on April 21, 2022, there were “only” two rockets standing on top of their launch pads on the Space Coast.
Artemis-1 won’t launch this time around, instead, it will return to the VAB sometime around April 26, 2022 for repairs to a faulty valve as well as other processing. While it is gone, repairs and upgrades will be made to the ground support equipment on Launch Complex 39-B, and hopefully when the rocket is rolled back out, its Wet Dress Rehearsal will run more smoothly.
Crew-4 is scheduled to launch in the pre-dawn hours on April 27th, 2022. It will head to the International Space Station and deliver four NASA astronauts there to being a six-month stint onboard.
Some Days You’re The Bug, Some Days You’re The Windshield
From the Port St. John Boat Ramp, located just off of US-1 in between Cocoa and Titusville: I’ve taken some really good night-time streak shots here, and wanted to check it out for a daytime launch, mainly because it’s just off of US-1 and really convenient.
Launch day was iffy from a weather standpoint: a cold front was slowing passing through the Space Coast region, and the ground winds were on the upper ends of SpaceX’s safety limits. After a delay in the morning to the afternoon to let the winds die down, the range was green. Skies were mostly cloudy, with thin, broken clouds showing gaps of blue.
Launch
The rocket lifted off perfectly and on-time at 1:51pm local time, and was another mission well executed. If only the photographer (me) had done his job that well!
The photo above is…okay…but it is not really anything write home about. I’m still chasing down a noise issue somewhere in the camera, and my fear is that it is just a characteristic of the sensor and firmware that I am going to have to live with. The only cure? A better camera. That will happen eventually.
The real issue, however, came from the site itself. As you can see below, there is a power pole that is perfectly situated on the line from the piers to SLC-40 out on CCSFS. After liftoff, that made itself glaringly apparent:
No worries, lesson learned and now I know what this doesn’t make anyone else’s list for launch viewing sites. It’s different for United Launch Alliance shots, because SLC-41 is at a slightly different angle. For SpaceX SLC-40 viewing, especially for photography, I would recommend other places.
As I mentioned earlier, there were a lot of clouds in the sky, and the best photos were made when Falcon9 was briefly visible in the gaps in between them.
At the end of the day, however, I got to see another rocket launching to orbit, and that’s nothing but a Good Thing™.
The lights were on as SpaceX began work on preparing Launch Complex 39-A ready for its next crewed mission. Axiom-1 is a private mission to ISS-NL and is set to launch NET April 6, 2022.
On the left, a crane rises over the construction site SpaceX has opened to build a launch pad for Starship, its super-heavy booster currently under development.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on March 3, 2022 from LC-39A. The Starlink 4-9 mission lofted 47 Starlink broadband satellites to orbit.
SpaceX Falcon 9 / Starlink 4-9 Liftoff, as seen from the Bennett Causeway in Cape Canaveral. Photo made with a 500mm lens and was cropped significantly.
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