SpaceX successfully launched a Dragon capsule on Saturday, September 28, carrying two astronauts, NASA’s Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Gorbunov, to the International Space Station (ISS). The mission’s primary goal is to return two astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who have been stranded on the ISS since June. Their original return was delayed due to a fault with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft, which returned to Earth without them. The Dragon capsule is scheduled to dock with the ISS on Sunday, September 29, and the astronauts are now expected to return to Earth in February.
While the Dragon capsule was successfully deployed into its planned orbit, a malfunction occurred with the second stage of the Falcon 9 rocket. The second stage, designed to perform a deorbit burn to prevent becoming space debris, did not execute the burn as planned. SpaceX confirmed the issue on social media, stating that the second stage safely landed in the ocean, but outside the targeted zone. The cause of the malfunction is under investigation.
This issue marks the third anomaly for SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket in recent months. As a result, SpaceX has grounded its Falcon 9 fleet while it works to identify the root cause. SpaceX said it will resume launches after a thorough review, delaying a planned mission to launch 20 broadband satellites for Eutelsat OneWeb from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
Despite the malfunction, the Crew-9 mission remains on track. The Dragon capsule “Freedom,” which was delayed from its original launch date due to Hurricane Helene, lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Saturday. The Falcon 9’s first stage completed its landing successfully, while the Dragon capsule continues its journey to the ISS, expected to arrive on Sunday evening around 21:30 GMT.
The malfunction in the Falcon 9’s second stage occurred less than 30 minutes after the deployment of the Dragon capsule into orbit. The stage’s Merlin Vacuum engine failed to perform the necessary deorbit burn, which is designed to guide the stage back into the atmosphere for destruction. Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist and expert on space launches, suggested that the failure could have been a slight underburn, resulting in the stage reentering the atmosphere further downrange than intended. SpaceX confirmed that the debris landed safely in the ocean, though outside the pre-determined area.
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