nasaspaceflight.com
SpaceX has rolled out its Falcon 9 rocket for a static fire on Monday at the company’s west coast launch facility at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California. The Jason-3 mission, scheduled to launch on 17 January 2016, will monitor Earth’s ocean’s surface topography and currents for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as part of the U.S. federal agency’s ongoing climate change research.
Path To Static Fire:
Activities at SpaceX’s West Coast launch facility at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, are ramping up for the scheduled mid-January launch of the Jason-3 mission for NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The launch campaign for Jason-3 marks the first time since September 2013 (the CASSIOPE mission) that SpaceX launch operations have taken place at Vandenberg and only the second time that SpaceX will make use of its west coast launch facilities.
As with all Falcon 9 missions, the first stage of the Falcon 9 has undergone a series of hot firings at the company’s McGregor, Texas, Test Facility.
Following the loss of the CRS-7 mission, the second stage was sent back to the SpaceX factory at Hawthorne, California for related modifications and improvements, before enjoying a successful 60 second test firing at McGregor on November 5 (L2).
Now in the business end of the flow, mating operations with the Falcon 9 and Transporter Erector (TEL) were delayed during the week due to adverse weather conditions at the usually fair-weather Vandenberg facility as southern California moves through the effects of this year’s strong El Nino event.
Mating operations resumed at the end of the week for one of the major pre-launch milestones: rollout, pad integration and the static test fire of the Falcon 9’s core stage at the pad.
The rollout of the Falcon 9 first stage for the Jason-3 static fire took place on Sunday of the test fire scheduled for Monday, 11 January – following the successful completion of the Flight Readiness Review (FRR) on Friday.
