The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Friday notified SpaceX of a proposed $175,000 civil penalty against the space transportation and rocketry giant for not submitting some safety data before launching an August 2022 Starlink mission (via Reuters).
According to the FAA, SpaceX failed to submit launch collision analysis trajectory data to the civil aviation regulator prior to the Starlink mission in question.
The FAA uses this data to evaluate the probability of a spacecraft crashing into any of the thousands of tracked objects in orbit around the Earth. Parties seeking launch clearance are required to submit this data to the agency at least seven days prior to an attempted launch.
SpaceX now has 30 days to respond to the FAA’s penalty notice.
This is far from the first time SpaceX has gotten in trouble with the FAA. The aviation watchdog found SpaceX’s flight tests of its Starship rocket in violation of launch regulations in 2020 and breaching launch license requirements in 2021.
On the latter occasion, the FAA revised SpaceX’s commercial launch requirements to require the presence of an FAA safety inspector at the company’s Boca China site for each launch.
The FAA also held up SpaceX’s long-awaited first orbital flight of its massive Starship, finally giving it the environmental greenlight in June 2022 after numerous delays. According to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, Starship’s first orbital flight attempt now “appears highly likely” for March.
