FAA plans to fine SpaceX $630,000 for alleged launch violations

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) plans to fine SpaceX more than $630,000 for allegedly failing to comply with regulations on two launches last year.

“Safety drives everything we do at the FAA, including a legal responsibility for the safety oversight of companies with commercial space transportation licenses,” FAA Chief Counsel Marc Nichols said in an emailed statement today (Sept. 17).

“Failure of a company to comply with the safety requirements will result in consequences,” he added.

The first launch cited by the FAA is PSN SATRIA, which lofted an Indonesian communications satellite from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station atop a Falcon 9 rocket on June 18, 2023.

Related: SpaceX launches PSN SATRIA communications satellite for Indonesia, lands rocket at sea (video)

That May, SpaceX “submitted a request to revise its communications plan related to” its license to launch from the site, according to the FAA’s statement. There were two proposed revisions — adding a new launch control room at one of the facility’s hangars and removing a readiness poll previously taken two hours before liftoff.

SpaceX launched PSN SATRIA with those revisions before the FAA had approved the request, according to the agency, which is proposing a $175,000 fine for each of the two alleged infractions.

The second launch in question is that of Jupiter 3, a giant telecom satellite that rode to orbit on a Falcon Heavy rocket on July 28, 2023 from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC), which is next door to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

For that mission, SpaceX used a newly built rocket propellant farm at KSC that the FAA had not yet approved; according to the agency, the company submitted a revision request concerning the propellant farm earlier that same month. The FAA is proposing a $283,009 penalty for this alleged violation, bringing the fine total for the two missions to $633,009.

SpaceX has 30 days to respond after receiving the FAA’s two enforcement letters, which were delivered today. You can read them here.

Company founder and CEO Elon Musk has already given a response of sorts, however.

“SpaceX will be filing suit against the FAA for regulatory overreach,” Musk said via X today, replying to a post reporting the newly proposed fines.

SpaceX’s frustration with the FAA, and with regulations in general, are palpable and public. Last week, for example, SpaceX published a lengthy blog post railing against the launch industry’s regulatory environment.

“Unfortunately, we continue to be stuck in a reality where it takes longer to do the government paperwork to license a rocket launch than it does to design and build the actual hardware,” SpaceX wrote in the post. “This should never happen and directly threatens America’s position as the leader in space.”

That post is largely focused on SpaceX’s giant new Starship vehicle, which the company is developing to take people and cargo to the moon and Mars. SpaceX says it has been ready to launch Starship’s fifth test flight since early August, but the FAA is still reviewing modifications SpaceX made to the vehicle configuration and mission profile ahead of that planned launch. That review likely won’t be done until late November, according to the FAA.

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 3:25 p.m. ET on Sept. 17 with the news that the FAA has posted its two enforcement letters, then again at 5:20 p.m. ET to add Elon Musk’s statement that SpaceX plans to file suit against the FAA.