SpaceX sends letter to Congress contesting proposed FAA fines
- by Space.com
- Sep 19, 2024
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For EchoStar XXIV/Jupiter 3, SpaceX used a newly built rocket propellant farm at KSC that had not yet been greenlit, the FAA stated.
SpaceX contests these alleged violations at length in the new letter, which it sent to the chair and ranking member of both the U.S. House Committee on Science, Space and Technology and the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.
For nearly two years, SpaceX has voiced its concerns with the FAA’s inability to keep pace with the commercial spaceflight industry. It is clear that the Agency lacks the resources to timely review licensing materials, but also focuses its limited resources on areas unrelated to… pic.twitter.com/2NJu00ZLiWSeptember 19, 2024
For example, the letter — which SpaceX also posted on X and emailed to journalists — claims that there is no requirement in the launch regulations to conduct a readiness poll two hours before liftoff. "Importantly, SpaceX conducts a poll prior to propellant loading, later in the count, consistent with safe operations," the company wrote.
The letter goes into great detail about the other two alleged infractions, explaining why SpaceX does not view them as such. For instance, the company noted that, on Aug. 20, 2023, the FAA issued a waiver allowing the use of the propellant farm ahead of SpaceX's launch of the Crew-7 astronaut mission for NASA, which lifted off from KSC on Aug. 26 of that year.
"The waiver that the FAA issued stated that granting the waiver 'would not jeopardize public health and safety, the safety of property, or any national security or foreign policy interest of the United States,'" SpaceX wrote.
"Since SpaceX's operations for the Echostar XXIV/Jupiter 3 launch and the Crew-7 launch were the same as related to the new RP-1 farm, it's not clear why the FAA made a positive safety determination for the Crew-7 launch, but could not do the same for the Echostar XXIV/Jupiter 3 launch," the company added. (RP-1 is the kerosene propellant used by the Merlin engines on the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy.)
Overall, SpaceX wrote, the company "forcefully rejects the FAA's assertion that it violated any regulations."
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