FAA Ends Second Starship Flight Accident Investigation

The FAA has finished investigating the Starship launch accident (photo: dock. SpaceX)

JAKARTA The launch of Starship in November last year ended in an explosion. As a result of the failure, the rocket made bySpaceXwas to be investigated by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

After three months of investigation, the FAA announced that it had closed its investigation into the Orbital Flight Test (OFT) 2 accident on Monday, February 26. FAA investigation results stated that Starship exploded after disposing of excess liquid oxygen.

This accident record is in accordance with SpaceX's statement on its official website. They stated that six rocket engines died during the Super Heavy bostback burning. As a result, the booster demolition happened faster than planned.

"The vehicle accident occurred more than three and a half minutes after flights at an altitude of 90 kilometers above the Gulf of Mexico. The main cause of the most likely RUD booster was the blockage of filters where liquid oxygen was supplied to the engine," SpaceX said in the update page.

After investigating the cause of the Starship crash, the FAA made dozens of improvements SpaceX had to take. This repair includes 7 Super Heavy booster fixes and 10 Starship upgrades.

One of the corrective actions SpaceX has to take against Super Heavy is redesigning vehicle hardware to increase tank filtration and reduce mud. Control algorithm machines for Super Heavy must also be updated.

Meanwhile, corrective action for Starship includes hardware redesign to increase endurance and reduce leakage and make operational changes in throwing away engine propellants.

Several other measures for Starship are, "renewable flammable analysis, installation of additional fire protection, creation of analytical guidance, performance of transient load analysis, and modeling updates."

SpaceX has prepared a third flight test for Starship, but they don't yet have a flight license. To get the license, SpaceX must work on all FAA repair measures first.