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kdiuro13 OP t1_j121owq wrote

Reply to comment by 8andahalfby11 in ESA's Vega-C launcher has suffered a failure in its first commercial flight by kdiuro13

Yep confirmed here. Underpressure in the 2nd stage. Either a failure to ignite or an underperform. Either way a launch failure. Apogee was 110km and vehicle impacted Atlantic Ocean shortly after.

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toodroot t1_j125b34 wrote

The ground camera says it lit. Remember 2 failures ago, when it burned through the top of the 2nd stage? This is a different stage (wider). But still.

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cjameshuff t1_j12f45p wrote

It looked like it lit, burned a while, then something happened that caused the plume to become much wider and more diffuse, and the stage was either gyrating or tumbling. Maybe a major failure of the nozzle?

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Barrrrrrnd t1_j12mtuo wrote

That’s what I was thinking. Either they burned through it or the back fell off. Either way they lost command authority and thrust.

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citoloco t1_j12x6ya wrote

What about the front?

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TADthePaperMaker t1_j16ei2f wrote

Well it’s not supposed to fall off, I can tell you that right now.

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cjameshuff t1_j15y1jx wrote

It seems like the third stage separated and ignited normally, and that's attached to the front. Maybe it broke away before that though, the CGI was obviously not an accurate depiction of what was going on.

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TbonerT t1_j151tje wrote

Probably something like that. You can see the speed start to drop right then, too.

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electromagneticpost t1_j12z6i7 wrote

At least they made it to space, although I don't think the satellites were supposed to end up at the bottom of the ocean.

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toodroot t1_j130no0 wrote

This is a good example of why most people think "space" means "orbit".

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electromagneticpost t1_j130wgn wrote

The Karmen Line, which is what I was going off of, is arbitrary with some aerodynamic calculations to back it up, it’s much easier to to define what an orbit is rather than where space begins.

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[deleted] t1_j131313 wrote

[deleted]

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