Malfunction Occurs During Launch, FAA Bans Falcon 9 Rockets For Flying

JAKARTA The Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) has banned Falcon 9 from flying for a while. This ban was given to SpaceX because the rocket malfunctioned and failed to make a landing.

This problem occurred on Saturday, September 28 when SpaceX launched the Crew-9 mission which brought NASA astronauts and Cosmonaut Roscosmos. Initially, the launch went smoothly. However, upon entering the second phase, Falcon 9 failed to start the engine.

As a result, the de-orbit process did not go well and the booster did not fall into the sea as usual. Citing from a Reuters report, the Falcon 9 booster crashed into the Pacific Ocean region. The location where the booster landed was outside the safe zone the FAA set.

Therefore, SpaceX is prohibited from using Falcon 9 in any form of launch. The company owned by Elon Musk must find out the cause behind the failure of the second phase of the rocket. If the investigation has been completed, Falcon 9 can be flown back.

Meanwhile, SpaceX has provided a statement regarding the failure of the Falcon 9 booster landing. The space company revealed that the de-orbit burning carried out by Falcon 9 did not match the nominal they set.

"As a result, the second stage landed safely in the ocean, but outside the targeted area," SpaceX said via platform X. "We will continue the launch once we better understand the root of the problem."

This is the third Falcon 9 case in three months. The FAA stopped Falcon 9 flights several times due to the second phase which was also problematic. As last July, for example, the second phase failed until satellites were deployed off the designated track.

Next, last August, Falcon 9 made it to Earth and the mission went without a problem, but the rocket exploded on landing. In this third crash, SpaceX had to carry out a engineering investigation back and wait for launch permission from the FAA.