241–250 of 455 posts
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Yes, a pure and full-blooded Dutch English Canadian American hero.
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Not into space things and while this is cool i wonder what the great significance of this is? I see lots signaling how great this is and it's lost on me.
The big thing is that it dramatically reduces the cost of shipping things into space. Previously it was difficult to ship anything much larger than a compact car in to orbit. Now you can ship half of a basketball court into orbit, including all the vertical space. Until very very recently the roughly bus sized ISS modules were the largest habitable spaces we could ship to orbit (although Skylab in the 70s were basica…
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Collision, yes, cascade no.
No. An object in orbit colliding with anything threatens to create debris in orbit. Debris in orbit collides with other objects in orbit, creating debris in orbit. That's a cascade.
> Debris in orbit collides with other objects in orbit, creating debris in orbit. That's a cascade
For the same reason not every nucleus that fractures on neutron bombardment sustains chain reactions not every orbital configuration supports a Kessler cascade. In LEO, it’s virtually impossible: you get a nuisance, not SOL.
Note that Kessler posited his syndrome before we could computationally verify it. We can now. It’s not a real threat in the long term, and is more of an insurance question than existential issue for spaceflight in the medium term. It’s pertinent in the very short term, militarily, which is partly how we know it’s very difficult to trigger across even limited orbits.
SpaceX just posted this video of the last test. It's one of the most inspiring things I've ever seen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hI9HQfCAw64
Not into space things and while this is cool i wonder what the great significance of this is? I see lots signaling how great this is and it's lost on me.
Personally, I can’t wait to see a massive, kilometer-wide telescope in space or nestled in a crater on the Moon. We might finally figure out dark matter, dark energy, anti-gravity.
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From Wiki [1]: SpaceX spent its own capital to develop and fly its previous launcher, Falcon 1, with no pre-arranged sales of launch services. SpaceX developed Falcon 9 with private capital as well, but did have pre-arranged commitments by NASA to purchase several operational flights once specific capabilities were demonstrated. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_9
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_1#Launches Customers: DARPA, DARPA, DOD/NASA, mass simulator (instead of the intended payload after the first three launches), Malaysia (the intended payload of the fourth flight). "pre-arranged commitments by NASA to purchase several operational flights" is a subsidy, as were the milestone payments along the way. I'm a huge SpaceX fan, but let's not pretend they could've done thi…
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Would you call all options and futures subsidies? Are airlines subsidizing oil companies when they purchase oil futures in order to hedge their oil costs? There is no indication that these commitments were underpriced by the government, so to call them subsidies is at best baseless misinformation.
> Are airlines subsidizing oil companies when they purchase oil futures in order to hedge their oil costs? No; both parties in the deal have successfully accomplished their respective roles repeatedly before. The airline isn't doing anything new; the oil company isn't doing anything new. (And they both absolutely get subsidized!) > There is no indication that these commitments were underpriced by the government... Th…
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Not sure he really cares about the country - but I guess you can be glad.
Seems he cares about it a great deal, he wants to make sure America is still a country where you can innovate and explore without the state blocking you at every turn. See Arianespace for how things would look if Elon had to deal with infamous European bureaucracy and red tape, the FAA is already bad enough.
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> 5 and 20 Starship launches per mission That is not actually such a big deal when you realize they are just ferrying fuel on a reusable rocket. They're also doing it well in advance of the mission. There is a massive logistics chain making it possible to buy fuel on your road trip, this is similar. > That's a clear regression from the Saturn V. Not exactly, as the fuel provided in orbit by these other missions will…
> Not exactly, as the fuel provided in orbit by these other missions will allow a much larger payload to reach the Moon's surface and return. Amortized over the number of launches it takes to get a single moonshot. > StarShip can already deliver a similar payload to orbit as Saturn V But Saturn V's purpose was not getting things to orbit. We have plenty of rockets capable of getting to orbit. And given that satellite…
Yet it was used to put Skylab in orbit.
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Maybe it's time for you to turn off your screen, go outside and touch some grass. Musk is an egotistical megalomaniac. To even think of his ego in any positive light makes the problem with you. Calling someone a pedophile because they wouldn't use his submarine is just an example.
That warped mine is responsible for an enormous amount of innovation. Wish we had more, similarly warped minds. > Calling someone a pedophile is just one example This clearly outweighs his efforts to bring the electric vehicle, space, and humanoid robotics revolutions.