SpaceX halts rocket launch at the last second

SpaceX aborted a rocket launch on Sunday after it experienced an engine power problem just before liftoff, the company said.

In a statement, SpaceX said a standard “auto-abort” on its Falcon 9 rocket was triggered because of “out of family data” during an engine power check.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for clarification, but during a livestream of the attempted launch, a company supervisor described the problem as a “condition regarding engine power.”

“There are a thousand ways a launch can go wrong and only one way it can go right,” said the supervisor, Michael Andrews. “Given that we are overly cautious on the ground and if the team or the vehicle sees anything even slightly off we’ll stop the countdown.”

Andrews added that the rocket appeared to be in good health.

The mission was halted after the countdown ended and the person announcing the launch said “liftoff.”

“Disregard,” she added a moment later. “We have an abort.”

The launch, from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, has not yet been rescheduled.

The mission was the sixth launch of “Starlink” satellites, which the company says will bring high performance broadband internet to underserved areas.

source: nbcnews.com