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> It says something about what they have done for rocketry when crashes on landing are note worthy. Err...??? Crashes of rockets always seem to be noteworthy. That's not anything specific to SpaceX.
Shivetya is talking about landing rockets afterwards. If they keep up the launch cadence next year, they will surpass the Shuttle in number of reuses in a space program.
I make efforts to add to discussions instead of subtracting with negativity. Recently, I've broken my rule quite a few times, fretting over the future of general compute. I'd vowed to not break it again, but the discussion about Starship lacks a vital perspective. . I don't understand the hype behind Starship. It's confusing to me. It is touching and nice; it's great to see people excited about space. However, the ex…
> This perception is mixed with a more dangerous one that the Starship is in a league of its own. It's not. Blue Origin's work and approach may be superior in the long run, as they're designing mission specific vehicles that are optimised to their context.
Has Blue Origin even gotten a rocket into orbit yet?
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For whatever reason, Wired preferred the clickbait title, but the opening sentence of the article is: "On Wednesday afternoon, SpaceX successfully launched—and nearly landed—a fully-assembled prototype of its next generation Starship rocket on a suborbital flight from its facility in south Texas."
Given that it's a rocket, "nearly land" could mean it kept going in some way, towards space or simply not yet touched down. So when I read the HN title and thought "what do they mean by nearly landed?" I then saw the article and realized "oh, it crashed". I'm not sure where the balance should be... "Crash" has a negative connotation, but "nearly lands" is a pretty soft euphemism.
I remember watching the Tesla going into space and the rockets landing on the platform. I remember thinking "Wow this man has restarted the space race for my generation." It was a hopeful and wonderful feeling, I figured with the budget cuts, the politics, and the general "been there done that" attitude that was prominent for much of my life space was closed. To see it opened again, gives me some sort of hope, some i…
As a young person (21), I feel the same way. Space exploration and a beautiful future suddenly seems achievable with hard work and a lot of engineering instead of just feeling impossible.
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> Getting involved is a dream of mine, but it's been quite difficult for me to get my foot in the door, so to speak. It is for all of us, it makes the journey that much better. I didn't get into to do any of that above until my mid 30s after starting late at ~26.
Does the journey have to be difficult to make the destination worth it? I suppose it does. Doesn't feel that way when you're still on your way though.
I make efforts to add to discussions instead of subtracting with negativity. Recently, I've broken my rule quite a few times, fretting over the future of general compute. I'd vowed to not break it again, but the discussion about Starship lacks a vital perspective. . I don't understand the hype behind Starship. It's confusing to me. It is touching and nice; it's great to see people excited about space. However, the ex…
1. Project Morpheus was a mostly inconsequential project just retreading the same areas pioneered by the DC-X.
2. Other than propellant, it has nothing to do with Raptor, likely the most advanced rocket engine ever made. The Raptor is the first successful full flowed staged combustion engine ever. This test alone demonstrates how robust it is in actual use across actual restarts.
3) The RS-25 was not reusable, every single one required many months and full rebuilds between flights. SpaceX has flown the same engines to space within a month with minimal maintenance.
4) The STS could not land autonomously, which is why two Astronauts has to risk their lives on that first launch. The Soviet Buran could and did land autonomously on its first flight.
5) BO isn’t even in the space flight business, it’s never out anything into orbit or even flown a single person or paid payload in its miniature sub-orbital rocket. BO is 15 years behind SpaceX in actual accomplishments.
6) Also you clearly aren’t qualified to judge Starship construction techniques. It’s payload and performance targets have been widely discussed and vetted.
Lastly NASA funded Falcon 9 development with the COTs contract, and got massive launch saving out of it. Far better deal than their Boeing contract. NASA has contributed almost nothing to Starship development other than jumping in late with a small Artemis contract and a tiny in orbit refueling contract.
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This is a lot of words to basically project a motivation onto the reporting about a thing which actually happened that isn't there. You're getting downvoted because this reads as "concern trolling". Let everyone else manage their own feelings.
This scenario has played out before, with Faster, Better, Cheaper from the 90s, and kind-of/loosely with STS. > Missions marked with an asterisk were considered failures (5 spacecraft failed in space; 1 project was canceled), putting the overall FBC success rate at a paltry 63%. This low success rate—and the fact that 4 of them occurred in one year, 1999—are what linger in the space community’s memory. > For example,…
I swear the thrust vectoring algorithm was just plain showing off at the very end. Just super cool to watch, looks like a render not real life; https://twitter.com/spacex/status/1336849897987796992?s=21
Raises a question: I suppose they fired 2/3 engines not because of a failure, but because 3 engines would produce too much thrust.
That does mean that in a high stakes situation (landing) you can't afford to lose an engine. I wonder if there's any margin there for lighting the third engine in case of engine failure.
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"Starship isn't anywhere close to the primetime. It's at least half-a-decade to a decade away from initial reusable testflights, and perhaps more given the under funding of the Artemis program." What would be the reason to believe it's that far from being usable? How would Artemis funding have anything to do with Starship? "It is worth remembering that early on in SpaceX's history, Musk made a dummy rocket and took i…
Re: Artemis & NASA The Artemis program and other contracts fund the bulk of Starship development. NASA has poured billions into SpaceX and they're SpaceX's largest "investor" by far, except NASA doesn't take equity and treats it as "pre-funding" an eventual contract (which would also pay per launch). Starship is (likely) to be mostly (up to 60% to 70% or so) NASA funded. https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-names-…
NASA has contributed very little to Starship development. The in orbit refueling experiment contract is tiny, as is their Artemis contract.
And Musk used a Falcon to promote SpaceX in Washington DC, what’s your point?
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As a young person (21), I feel the same way. Space exploration and a beautiful future suddenly seems achievable with hard work and a lot of engineering instead of just feeling impossible.
I'd really think a bit more about it. We have so many problems here and none are solved by leaving. Climate change, wealth inequality, hungry, poor. None of the billionaires (Musk/Bezos) building rockets treat their workers terribly well now, and their end game will just be exploiting workers around the solar system. Coming as a past fan of space exploration is was pretty devastating to realize...