FAA Lifts Falcon 9 Flight Restrictions

In a statement late in the day on Friday, Oct. 11, the FAA said it cleared launches of the Falcon 9 that, with one exception, had been on hold since a Falcon 9 upper stage suffered a problem with a final deorbit burn on the Sept. 28 launch of the Crew-9 mission for NASA.  The engine burn occurred and the upper stage re-entered as it should but not ended up not being disposed of in the Pacific where it was supposed to end up.

The launch of the European Hera mission on Monday was given a separate permission to launch. The agency said it was because the upper stage wasn't going to reenter but was to accelerate the Hera spacecraft to escape velocity.

Gee... the Falcon 9 was grounded from just after midnight, the morning of September 29 until October 11. Twelve days! The first time was 14 days. Like the first time, this one must have been a gut-wrenching few minutes of troubleshooting - maybe a whole half hour!  (I really need to figure out where I left that sarcasm font.) Neither the FAA nor SpaceX elaborated on the findings of that investigation or the corrective actions that resulted from it.

Lift off of this past Monday morning's Hera mission from SLC-40 on Cape Canaveral SFS. T +4 seconds.

Somewhat off-subject is that Starship Flight Test 5 is still penciled in for Sunday morning at 8:00 AM EDT, although I can't find evidence the FAA has approved this test. Since it wasn't related to this FAA hold, it's not covered by this lifting of it. The last thing heard from SpaceX is that they expected approval in time for the Sunday Flight Test.