SpaceX forced to cancel CRS-18 Falcon 9 rocket launch due to weather

By Mathew Katz Published July 24, 2019

SpaceX had to once again delay its latest Falcon 9 rocket launch on Wednesday, this time due to poor weather, delaying a planned supply run to the International Space Station.

Elon Musk’s private space company called off the launch just before 3:30 p.m. PT because of cloudy skies above Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. SpaceX’s team waited until almost the last possible second to abort the mission, announcing that it would scrub the launch with less than a minute before the scheduled launch at 3:24 p.m.

Recommended Videos

“Standing down today due to weather; backup launch opportunity is tomorrow at 6:01 p.m. EDT, 22:01 UTC,” SpaceX tweeted after scrubbing the mission.

Standing down today due to weather; backup launch opportunity is tomorrow at 6:01 p.m. EDT, 22:01 UTC

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) July 24, 2019

The company had said that weather was “30% favorable” for the launch earlier on Wednesday morning.

“I notice plenty of humidity out there, but another thing we have to deal with is the direction of the steering flow, or where the winds in the atmosphere are going to steer those afternoon showers and thunderstorms,” U.S. Air Force weather officer Will Ulrich said during a pre-launch news conference Wednesday. “Today, we have winds that will concentrate the majority of today’s showers and thunderstorms near the spaceport.”

Officials had hoped for a break in the clouds as there had been earlier in the day, but didn’t have quite such good luck. The company now plans to try again on Thursday, though the forecast for the area calls for thunderstorms, which may delay the launch once again. The launch had previously been delayed from earlier in July.

SpaceX’s 20^th Dragon spacecraft mission to the International Space Station will eventually bring 5,000 lbs of supplies to the ISS. The cargo includes a 3D printer that could someday “print” human organs and other supplies for ongoing experiments.

The past few months have been full of ups and downs for SpaceX. In June, the company managed to successfully launch its Falcon Heavy rocket at night, a feat that Musk called its “most difficult launch ever.” But the company also had to deal with its Starhopper rocket being engulfed in flames last week. Musk said there was no major damage caused by the fire.

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Mathew is a news editor at Digital Trends, specializing in covering all kinds of tech news — from video games to policy. He…

Cars

Jaguar Land Rover, Nissan hit the brake on shipments to U.S. over tariffs

Range Rover Sport P400e

Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has announced it will pause shipments of its UK-made cars to the United States this month, while it figures out how to respond to President Donald Trump's 25% tariff on imported cars.

"As we work to address the new trading terms with our business partners, we are taking some short-term actions, including a shipment pause in April, as we develop our mid- to longer-term plans," JLR said in a statement sent to various media.

Computing

DeepSeek readies the next AI disruption with self-improving models

DeepSeek AI chatbot running on an iPhone.

Barely a few months ago, Wall Street’s big bet on generative AI had a moment of reckoning when DeepSeek arrived on the scene. Despite its heavily censored nature, the open source DeepSeek proved that a frontier reasoning AI model doesn’t necessarily require billions of dollars and can be pulled off on modest resources.

It quickly found commercial adoption by giants such as Huawei, Oppo, and Vivo, while the likes of Microsoft, Alibaba, and Tencent quickly gave it a spot on their platforms. Now, the buzzy Chinese company’s next target is self-improving AI models that use a looping judge-reward approach to improve themselves.

Cars

Toyota shifts gears: 15 New EVs and a million cars by 2027

Front three quarter view of the 2023 Toyota bZ4X.

After years of cautiously navigating the electric vehicle (EV) market, Toyota is finally ramping up its commitment to fully electric vehicles.
The Japanese automaker, which has long relied on hybrids, is now planning to develop about 15 fully electric models by 2027, up from five currently. These models will include vehicles under the Toyota and Lexus brands, with production expected to reach 1 million units annually by that year, according to a report from Nikkei.
This strategy marks a significant shift for Toyota, which has thus far remained conservative in its approach to electric cars. The company sold just 140,000 EVs globally in 2024—representing less than 2% of its total global sales. Despite this, Toyota is aiming for a much larger presence in the EV market, targeting approximately 35% of its global production to be electric by the end of the decade.
The Nikkei report suggests the company plans to diversify its production footprint beyond Japan and China and expanding into the U.S., Thailand, and Argentina. This would help mitigate the impact of President Donald Trump’s 25% tariffs on all car imports, as well as reduce delivery times. Toyota is also building a battery plant in North Carolina.
For now, Toyota has only two fully electric vehicles on the U.S. market: The bZ4X and the Lexus RZ models. The Japanese automaker is expected to introduce new models like the bZ5X and a potential electric version of the popular Tacoma pickup.
Separately, Toyota and Honda, along with South Korea’s Hyundai, all announced on April 4 that they would not be raising prices, at least over the next couple of months, following the imposition of U.S. tariffs. According to a separate Nikkei report, Toyota’s North American division has told its suppliers that it will absorb the extra costs of parts imported from Mexico and Canada. Another 25% for automotive parts imported to the U.S. is slated to come into effect on May 3.