All four of the Dragon capsule's thrusters are working normally again, Elon Musk announced on twitter:
Without the thrusters, the capsule was gradually losing altitude, being pulled into the Earth by its gravity. The thrusters are being engaged to move the capsule into a higher orbit and will move it to the International Space Station.
Because of the thruster malfunction, the planned docking with the ISS tomorrow won't happen. It may happen on Sunday, but the date and time are still uncertain.
EARLIER:
Elon Musk just announced on twitter that the SpaceX team has gotten two of the Dragon Capsule's thrusters working, enough to get the capsule back under active control.
He also said in a press conference that the other two thrusters seem to be functional and should be fired up "within an hour," so, by 4:30 p.m. EST.
He then told reporters in a press conference that things are looking good.
"We've been deeply engaged in trying to figure out what went wrong with the Dragon thruster system and just moments ago we were able to bring the pods 1 and 4 online. We are now working to get 2 and 3 online as well. They are actually looking quite good.
I'm optimistic that we will be able to turn all four thruster pods on. And regain full control."
Thrusters 2 and 3 seem to be functional, but haven't been turned on yet.
The thrusters malfunctioned following launch this morning, and three were non operational. Since the Falcon 9 rocket deposited the SpaceX Dragon Capsule into space, it has been drifting aimlessly through space, instead of navigating its way to the space station as planned. It can stay up there for a few months, Musk said in the press conference.
"We noticed after separation we noticed that only one of the four thruster pods was ready to engage," Musk said. "We saw the oxidizer pressure in three of the four tanks was low. We spend that last several hours trying to fix the problem and we think we have. And if that's the case it will be a huge relief."
An issue with a propellant valve caused the malfunction, NASA says. Musk just said, "it looks like there was some blockage in the oxidizer pressurization and we've been able to free that blockage."
The thrusters are what move the capsule when it's docking with the ISS, so while the rocket successfully got the cargo to space, the Dragon can't maneuver into position to dock with the space station. The two they've gotten on line should be enough to make it to the space station, but three are needed for docking.
The capsule is SpaceX's second mission, funded by NASA, to deliver cargo to the International Space Station.
The first launch, in October, was a success.
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-dragon-thrusters-are-back-online-2013-3
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