this post was submitted on 21 Sep 2023
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Did you know that the FAA has re-entry licences? Neither did Varda (arstechnica.com)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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I'd seen the story about a spacecraft making a drug in microgravity and planning to land it in the US.

However, the recovery of Varda's capsule is on hold after the Federal Aviation Administration and the US Air Force recently declined to give Varda approval to land its spacecraft in a remote part of Utah. TechCrunch first reported the FAA turned down Varda's application for a commercial reentry license.

"Varda Space Industries launched its vehicle into space without a reentry license," an FAA spokesperson told Ars on Wednesday. "The FAA denied the Varda reentry license application on September 6 because the company did not demonstrate compliance with the regulatory requirements."

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

The title here is definitely misrepresenting the situation. Varda is the first company to try to get a reentry license from the FAA through Part 450, which was supposed to streamline things. They've been working on it for awhile.

I don't know whether the lesson learned will be to get your reentry license for this kind of thing before launch or some design flaw or something, but it sucks to be stuck.

If a desert landing is a non-starter for some untold reason, I wonder if they'd be able to do an ocean recovery? I'm guessing that would be a last resort for Varda because of the extra damage it would do to the capsule.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I chose the title because I thought and hoped it's a reasonable inference.

As an example, the first time I booked my own air flight -- actually, every time -- I made sure it was a ticket for the days and places I want, and that I got to my home at the end.

Do you know more about this Varda licensing situation? Is it possible to get a re-entry licence before launch? If they could have, they're incompetent not to. If not, that seems like a ridiculous regulation, requiring someone to launch with no confidence that they can legally come back (and possibly still incompetence on Varda's part for not making sure all the conditions were going to be met).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

No idea, but it's a new process. Here's an article from late July about the same issue:

https://spacenews.com/varda-waiting-on-faa-license-to-return-space-manufacturing-capsule/