SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is currently grounded once again as the second stage did not land in the expected area of the ocean after a successful mission delivering a Dragon capsule and crew to orbit.
The company stated in a post on X that they will resume launches once they have a better understanding of the root cause.
The successful Crew-9 mission carried NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov to the International Space Station. Despite a glitch during the second stage’s deorbit burn, the astronauts arrived safely.
This issue marks the third anomaly in three months for Falcon 9, with previous issues occurring in July and August. Despite these challenges, SpaceX quickly resumed launches after addressing the root causes of the problems.
The latest issue may delay upcoming critical missions, including the European Space Agency’s Hera mission and NASA’s Europa clipper mission. Additionally, a Falcon 9 mission to launch internet satellites for Eutelsat OneWeb was also delayed.
