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Bangalore: Virgin Galactic’s crewed spaceflight with CEO Richard Branson this July is under investigation by the Federal Aviation Administration for its designated airspace mid-flight exit, the FAA said Wednesday after a report. the new Yorker, which outlined the difficulties experienced in flight, including warning lights, that should have caused the pilots to abort the mission.
According to report good, written by Nicholas Schmidley, who recently published the book Test Gods: Virgin Galactic and the Making of a Modern Astronaut, the pilots saw a yellow and red warning light in the middle of the flight. The first yellow warning went off while climbing, indicating that the spacecraft’s nose cone was not angled properly and was affecting the climb. The issue approached peak altitude, and the alert changed to a red light, for which the safest option would be to abort the mission, according to insiders cited. the new Yorker.
But the mission continued and two pilots also returned the crew of six to Earth. Flight radar data showed that during the mission, the flight exited its designated airspace. The FAA confirmed in the report that the flight had “deviated from its air traffic control clearance” and that “the investigation is ongoing”.
The report also outlined the circumstances under which Virgin Galactic’s lead test pilot and flight test director, Mark Stuckey, left the company earlier this year. Stucky reportedly raised concerns about “setting deadlines” and the lack of transparency the author published in his book.
Following the publication of his book, Stucky was reportedly removed from his flying duties, and a week after Branson’s flight, was fired from the company.
Read also: Bezos, Branson and Musk – are billionaires popularizing space travel or just on an ego trip?
Itrajectory alert
The warning alerts that stopped during the climb were related to the path the vehicle was taking, affecting the path known as the entry glide cone. Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo is a spacecraft that is launched into the air from a carrier aircraft. It uses rocket motors to take off, and after a few minutes of weightlessness, lands on a runway back to Earth.
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The path the spacecraft can follow to glide back to the surface is an imaginary cone within which the vehicle must begin its descent with sufficient energy. The alert indicated that the pilots were not climbing high enough for optimal re-entry, the report reported.
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The ship’s trajectory also meant that it deviated from within its designated flight airspace, mandated for each flight to prevent collisions with other air traffic.
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In the report, author Schmidley describes a previous company meeting with flight pilots, Dave McKay and Mike Masucci, in 2015, where a NASA astronaut told pilots that the yellow light must be extremely dangerous because “when it If it turns red then it is also going to be late”.
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in a statement to ReutersA Virgin Galactic spokesperson acknowledged that the trajectory deviated and the flight fell below the height of the airfield for 1 minute and 41 seconds, but that the ship posed no danger to the public or crew. The high-altitude winds “altered the trajectory” of the vehicle, and the pilots ensured it was within mission standards, the statement said.
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Virgin Galactic’s flights have faced dangerous obstacles in the past. In 2014, a mid flight explosion In the test flight attributed to human error, one pilot was killed and another was seriously injured. Schmidley also described in his book how the same pilots, McKay and Masucci, were conducting a test flight in 2018 when they lost control of the vehicle and began to fall.
Later investigations revealed that there were manufacturing defects that required months to fix. In 2019, another issue damaged the ship on a test flight with the same two pilots, causing Virgin Galactic’s then vice president of safety and testing to tell Schmidt, “I don’t know how we didn’t lose the vehicle and killed three people.” kill.”
interpersonal conflict
Mark Stuckey was the flight test director for several test flights, and had reportedly become concerned about being “overworked and unwise” and cutting deadlines. Schmidley reports that he was “particularly upset” by the reluctance of the two pilots to admit to human error in the test flights. He had reportedly emailed his team on several occasions raising concerns.
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In May of this year, after criticism of Stuckey surfaced in Schmidley’s book, he was excluded from major meetings and spaceflight planning activities prior to the July 11 flight. The report said that after a decade with the program, Stucky had no responsibility on Branson’s flight, and was fired eight days later on Zoom.
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Virgin Galactic is scheduled to make its next test flight in September, after the ongoing FAA investigation likely ends.
Read also: Rockets emit 100 times more CO₂ per passenger than flights – imagine a space tourism industry
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