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SES-10 Mission

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Re: SES-10 Mission

#361
post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a reach. For comparison, lets start a city on top of Mt Everest? Better air, better weather, lots easier to get to, and help is only days away instead of months. Yet we haven't begun to do things even that ambitious yet.

We have no reason to start a city on Mt Everest. We would not do it just for training, if we are going to do it, there must be a good reason.

How about, so we learn how? So everybody doesn't die the first week on Mars?

Re: SES-10 Mission

#362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a reach. For comparison, lets start a city on top of Mt Everest? Better air, better weather, lots easier to get to, and help is only days away instead of months. Yet we haven't begun to do things even that ambitious yet.

There's no special humanity wide significance to having a city on Mt. Everest. And there is also no new science that such a city would enable. Lastly, it wouldn't teach us anything about our place in the universe.

Talking about trial runs for Mars, which of course will be far less exciting. But can we imagine doing even that much? It seems preposterous to put a city on a tall mountain - but we're already talking about another planet.

Re: SES-10 Mission

#363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no special humanity wide significance to having a city on Mt. Everest. And there is also no new science that such a city would enable. Lastly, it wouldn't teach us anything about our place in the universe.

Talking about trial runs for Mars, which of course will be far less exciting. But can we imagine doing even that much? It seems preposterous to put a city on a tall mountain - but we're already talking about another planet.

I can imagine it :)

It's hard to say when and how, of course. It might not happen in any serious fashion until asteroid mining and space tourism became real industries, which should result in improved tech and much lower costs for building Mars colonies.

Re: SES-10 Mission

#364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we can survive on mars, we can survive on Earth no matter what can plausibly happen to it. Exactly. So going to Mars and staying there long-term will require us to develop many solutions that can be applied here on Earth. Both under current conditions and conditions that would currently be civilisation-threatening.

So the whole thing is nothing but an exercice in survivalism? That is ludicruous. There is no need for that.

It is one of Musks stated goals to secure better survival ability for humanity. Many others involved have other goals.

It seems prudent to avoid keeping all the eggs in one basket by staying only on this one spacerock.

Re: SES-10 Mission

#365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the whole thing is nothing but an exercice in survivalism? That is ludicruous. There is no need for that.

It is one of Musks stated goals to secure better survival ability for humanity. Many others involved have other goals. It seems prudent to avoid keeping all the eggs in one basket by staying only on this one spacerock.

For the individual, survivalism does not make too much sense to me. Our days are numbered anyways, no-one lives forever.

However as a civilization, which spans many generations and may go on forever, the situation is a bit different.

Re: SES-10 Mission

#366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't they obtain insurance for the total cost of the mishap?

Losing a payload can have a domino effect of bad things that insurance doesn't cover. Kind of like how your car insurance won't pay for your lost income if you get in an accident and then get fired for missing work. Maybe the car analogy is a bit of a stretch, but look at Spacecom, whose Amos-6 satellite blew up during a static fire back in September (this wasn't actually covered by launch insurance, but Spacecom had…

You can likely get car accident coverage that will cover anything you want, if you're willing to pay whatever premium your insurer decides is appropriate given your desired coverage amount and probability of a payout. These companies aren't buying off-the-shelf mass market insurance plans; it's up to their risk management people to figure out what the true cost of an accident is and negotiate appropriate coverage if they don't want to eat the risk themselves.

Re: SES-10 Mission

#368
post #229
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That cut to black nearly gave me a damn heart attack haha. Satellite connection lost because rocket exhaust is basically a giant ionized cloud of noise. Elon looks like he hasn't been getting enough sleep or showers, and like he's about to back flip and start happy crying.

Bit worried myself, One of those grid stabilisers on the first stage was definitely melting on the way back (@26mins on Youtube) just before first stage camera went on the fritz.

It just got covered in soot from the ablative protection (okay, probably some Al2O3 too, from the subsequently burning grid fin) on the grid fins burning off. GTO/GEO missions come in _really_ hot!
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