The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
1–10 of 187 posts
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#2It's been interesting to see SpaceX shift from hardware-rich to a more traditional process the last year. I suspect a lot of it is due to the sheer cost of what they are doing, but a lot of it is PR management as well... Plus it's obvious that the US government is doing everything in their power to have Musk on as short of a leash as possible.
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#3It's been interesting to see SpaceX shift from hardware-rich to a more traditional process the last year. I suspect a lot of it is due to the sheer cost of what they are doing, but a lot of it is PR management as well... Plus it's obvious that the US government is doing everything in their power to have Musk on as short of a leash as possible.
SpaceX moved beyond what they could test without the launch (and catch) tower. They've spent a lot of time and money developing the ground systems - in comparison the early crude Starship prototypes were comparatively cheap and easily replaced - and I would imagine they really would prefer not to accidentally demolish the tower again.
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#4Schools (where I am in the Uk) aren't back till Tuesday next week, so I'm looking forward to being able to watch this with my kids. However it goes it's going to be an incredible sight.
Launch window opens 1pm BST (7am ET).
Good luck to everyone at SpaceX!
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#5I am so looking forward to watching this behemoth fly.
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#6Sounds like they are not planning on testing the booster catch yet, I wonder what's stopping them
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#7Sounds like they are not planning on testing the booster catch yet, I wonder what's stopping them
They haven’t launched and recovered it at all yet, have they? Presumably they want to test out to sea where it won’t blow up the only launch tower if it comes in hot.
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#8Sounds like they are not planning on testing the booster catch yet, I wonder what's stopping them
Risk of damaging their only launchpad, I would assume.
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#9Sounds like they are not planning on testing the booster catch yet, I wonder what's stopping them
The hardware at the launch site is hundreds of millions of dollars (or more). They won't want to test that till they are sure they can fly the thing.
The Flacon 9 did a fair few simulated landing over water before they tried on land or risked and barge.
Re: The FAA has granted SpaceX permission to launch its Starship rocket
#10Sounds like they are not planning on testing the booster catch yet, I wonder what's stopping them
That's correct, there will be no catch attempt this launch. They're going to simulate a landing by attempting to do soft land it in the Gulf of Mexico.
The reason is pretty straightforward: this vehicle has never flown before and a lot can go wrong. There is a lot of ground equipment including propellant tanks very close to the launch tower. If anything goes wrong hundreds of tons of metal + propellant is going to cause a lot of damage, and they'd likely end up having to rebuild a large portion of their launch area. Best to see how the booster behaves first before risking all that infrastructure.