The voyage of a Colorado-built satellite came to a crashing end after a low-cost rocket designed to send the spacecraft into orbit failed during its maiden launch.
After years of delays, the FalconSAT-2 satellite finally lifted off aboard a rocket Friday afternoon from a launch pad on the Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific Ocean’s Marshall Islands. The satellite and the Falcon 1 rocket – which cost $6.7 million – were destroyed shortly after launch.
“We had a successful liftoff and Falcon made it well clear of the launch pad, but unfortunately, the vehicle was lost later in the first-stage burn,” read a posting on the rocket company’s website. “More information will be posted once we have had time to analyze the problem.”
Dozens of cadets at the U.S. Air Force Academy north of Colorado Springs spent more than two years and countless hours working on the satellite, which was set to study the effects space particles have on space-based communications, including the Global Positioning System and other civil and military communications.
“We worked on the program almost consistently just about every night,” 1st Lt. Luke Sauter, the chief engineer on the satellite project, said in an interview a few hours before the launch. “It was really a labor of love.”
Sauter, 26, worked on the project from 2001 to 2002 while attending the academy. He is now stationed at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico.
Officials for the base and the academy did not return calls following Friday’s disaster.
The satellite, which cost $750,000, was completed in 2002. It weighed 43 pounds and was 12.5 inches wide.
It was originally scheduled to be launched aboard a space shuttle in 2003 but was shelved when missions were put on hold after the destruction of the shuttle Columbia as it re-entered Earth’s atmosphere.
The Falcon 1 rocket was built by Space Exploration Technologies, an El Segundo, Calif.-based startup aiming to cut the cost of launches from more than $100 million to less than $10 million.
PayPal founder Elon Musk started Space Exploration, or SpaceX. He has already spent a good chunk of his fortune on the rocket venture.
The rocket’s launch had been postponed three times since November because of equipment glitches and weather delays before finally blasting off Friday.
Staff writer Andy Vuong can be reached at 303-820-1209 or avuong@denverpost.com.
