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On Monday, September 19 at 3pm PDT/6pm EDT/22:00 UTC, Firefly Aerospace will attempt to get to orbit for the first time on the "To the Black" mission with their Firefly Alpha. This will be Firefly's 2nd orbital launch attempt, it's first in September 2021, was terminated after an engine shut down. This turned out to be an issue in the electric systems. The team made some modifications to the engine and do not expect the same issue to happen again.
Mission Payloads (source: Firefly website)
Teachers in Space — Serenity
Class: 3U CubeSat
Dimensions: 32cm x 10cm x 10cm
Mass: 1.67Kg
Mission: To collect flight data during the mission and make it available to the educational community for analysis and comparison to data collected on other flights and vehicles.
Typical data collected: Atmospheric pressure, Temperature, and Radiation via a matched pair of Geiger counters, one wrapped in experimental radiation protection material, one unwrapped
Class: 3U CubeSat
Dimensions: 10cm x 10cm x 34cm
Mass: 4.15kg
Mission: The TechEdSat-15 is a three-unit CubeSat that weighs 9.1 pounds and carries experiments that are being advanced in TechEdSat’s Nano-Orbital Workshop (NOW) rapid flight development series.
TechEdSat-15’s primary experiment is a version of an exo-brake intended to survive much higher temperature environments – several hundred degrees – than in previous flights. It will demonstrate the next step forward in nanosatellites’ ability to target an Earth entry point.
The exo-brake is a device that applies drag in Earth’s exosphere – the uppermost reaches of the atmosphere – to slow the speed of a satellite’s descent and change its direction. This experiment will permit the satellite to survive closer-to-peak heating, maintain telemetry, and assess the dynamics as the system enters the top of the atmosphere.
Another experiment on TechEdSat-15 includes the Beacon And Memory Board Interface (BAMBI), which optimizes internal and external data transfer from the nanosatellite.
The TechEdSat-NOW series has multiple research goals including using the exo-brake to de-orbit high-altitude nanosatellites at end of mission to reduce issues related to orbital debris. Additionally, drag modulation has uses for sample return from low-Earth orbit as well as tailoring orbits during aero-pass maneuvers for future planetary applications.
Libre Space Foundation — PicoBus
Class: PicoSat Deployer
Dimensions: 37cm x 12cm x 15cm
Mass: 6.327Kg (including dispenser)
Mission: An 8P Pocketqube deployer to be used to deploy 6 picosatellites into space and test the world’s first fully free and open source telecommunications constellation
GENESIS-L & GENESIS-N (AMSAT Spain). Objective: Technology demonstration for radio-amateurs, micro sub-joule pulsed plasma thruster & test platform to build heritage for future missions
FOSSASAT-1B. Objective: Communication & Remote sensing Technology Demonstrator of LoRa telecommunications, ADCS demonstration, & low-resolution earth imager experiment.
Qubik-1 & Qubik-2 (Libre Space). Objective: Communication Technology Demonstrator performing multiple telecommunication experiments
You can watch the launch live from Everyday Astronaut starting at about an hour prior to liftoff below. This will be the 116th orbital launch attempt of 2022.
Do you think Firefly will get to orbit this time?
Failure (Image Credit: NASASpaceflight)
Success (Image Credit: Firefly)
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