This was a bad day to go into space
April 20, 2023 8:14 AM Subscribe
SpaceX's gigantic (and currently uncrewed) Starship rocket had its initial stacked launch, which started out great and then things got out of control, literally. The second link is video that starts about 30 seconds before launch and has a lot of reactions from the Space X staff watching the launch and their energy is, shall we say, uplifting to hear.
I'm having some second thoughts about buying that rocket blowtorch.
posted by box at 8:15 AM on April 20, 2023
posted by box at 8:15 AM on April 20, 2023
The moment a rocket loses positive control there's typically a Very Serious Air Force Lieutenant whose sole job is to push the Boom Button. Apparently Elon laid off the Range Safety Officer and replaced them with a poop emoji.
Sure, just let the biggest rocket in the world tumble end over end on its own out of control for 30 seconds.
posted by tclark at 8:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [61 favorites]
Sure, just let the biggest rocket in the world tumble end over end on its own out of control for 30 seconds.
posted by tclark at 8:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [61 favorites]
My favourite phrase from the press on this is rapid unscheduled disassembly.
posted by warriorqueen at 8:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [48 favorites]
posted by warriorqueen at 8:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [48 favorites]
SpaceX is calling this: "...a rapid unscheduled disassembly...."
posted by Fizz at 8:18 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by Fizz at 8:18 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
The spin on this is that anything after getting Starship safely off the gantry was "icing on the cake," that is to say the billion-dollar-fireball was a roaring success.
senses of humor were unaffected: “Starship just experienced what we call a rapid unplanned disassembly,” an official said on the broadcast.
posted by chavenet at 8:18 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
senses of humor were unaffected: “Starship just experienced what we call a rapid unplanned disassembly,” an official said on the broadcast.
posted by chavenet at 8:18 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Knowing the guy in charge, I'll be looking forward to the next attempt on June 9th.
posted by May Kasahara at 8:22 AM on April 20, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by May Kasahara at 8:22 AM on April 20, 2023 [15 favorites]
There was a point just after clearing the pad where the whole rocket shimmied in a terrifying way, I think from the unbalanced thrust of some of the engines being out and/or blowing up.
posted by joeyh at 8:24 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
posted by joeyh at 8:24 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
I wonder if the RSO reluctance and the big cheers for the boom were a result of Elon being in the room and no one wanting to be thunk into the cornfield.
posted by credulous at 8:25 AM on April 20, 2023 [24 favorites]
posted by credulous at 8:25 AM on April 20, 2023 [24 favorites]
The spin on this is that anything after getting Starship safely off the gantry was "icing on the cake," that is to say the billion-dollar-fireball was a roaring success.
In fairness to the old Phony Stark, they said that before the launch too. SpaceX test flights are very often actual tests rather than victory laps.
posted by jaduncan at 8:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [19 favorites]
In fairness to the old Phony Stark, they said that before the launch too. SpaceX test flights are very often actual tests rather than victory laps.
posted by jaduncan at 8:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [19 favorites]
The shimmying could have been an atmospheric effect. If it wasn't, it looked really bad for the health of the spaceship.
posted by Spike Glee at 8:28 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Spike Glee at 8:28 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
There were at least three engines out at launch. As many as six (that I could see) during flight.
Can someone please explain why the plan was to partly flip the rocket before stage-separation? It seems like a lot of undue physics being introduced into a highly dynamic event.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:29 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Can someone please explain why the plan was to partly flip the rocket before stage-separation? It seems like a lot of undue physics being introduced into a highly dynamic event.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:29 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Sure, the rocket had a rapid unscheduled assembly, and sure, letting the rocket tumble end over end was just good fun. It's not like there was anyone downrange.
(checks notes, sees several million people throughout the Caribbean downrange)
It's not like there's anyone Apartheid Heir Elon cares about downrange.
Also, even if the rocket fails you're not supposed to turn tons of concrete under your launch platform into flying shrapnel.
Shotwell needs to put a leash on that goon of a boss of hers. SpaceX may be crowing about the launch, but I'm pretty sure this one went bad in ways far outside what was intended or expected.
posted by tclark at 8:30 AM on April 20, 2023 [43 favorites]
(checks notes, sees several million people throughout the Caribbean downrange)
It's not like there's anyone Apartheid Heir Elon cares about downrange.
Also, even if the rocket fails you're not supposed to turn tons of concrete under your launch platform into flying shrapnel.
Shotwell needs to put a leash on that goon of a boss of hers. SpaceX may be crowing about the launch, but I'm pretty sure this one went bad in ways far outside what was intended or expected.
posted by tclark at 8:30 AM on April 20, 2023 [43 favorites]
sounds like it was having a bad problem and will not go to space today
posted by taquito sunrise at 8:34 AM on April 20, 2023 [18 favorites]
posted by taquito sunrise at 8:34 AM on April 20, 2023 [18 favorites]
Was this the rocket stuffed full of - potentially illegal - space X satellites or is that another (future?) Scheduled launch ?
posted by Faintdreams at 8:38 AM on April 20, 2023
posted by Faintdreams at 8:38 AM on April 20, 2023
I watched with without sound, and the whole time wondering "is it supposed to do that?", "wait, is that leaking something", "oh that can't be right", but I guess rockets always look like they're just about to go out of control and explode.
The dark side of me wants to edit the video with shots of Melon Busk in a spacesuit strapped into the cockpit of that rocket, turning knobs and flipping switches, ostensibly on his first solo flight into space, all the way up to the explosion and people cheering, but that would be mean.
posted by AzraelBrown at 8:39 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
The dark side of me wants to edit the video with shots of Melon Busk in a spacesuit strapped into the cockpit of that rocket, turning knobs and flipping switches, ostensibly on his first solo flight into space, all the way up to the explosion and people cheering, but that would be mean.
posted by AzraelBrown at 8:39 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
Listening to all that cheering and whooping while the rocket is still sitting on the launchpad just makes me think that this is the opposite of a professional organization. Maybe it's because I've had those clips of NASA launches ingrained into my brain that always showed cool, calm, adults taking everything so seriously--you know as professionals do. I swear even a group of grade school children wouldn't be this overexcited and rowdy.
posted by sardonyx at 8:41 AM on April 20, 2023 [53 favorites]
posted by sardonyx at 8:41 AM on April 20, 2023 [53 favorites]
If you're pretty sure something bad is going to happen during a test to the point where you're diminishing expectations before the test, why bother testing?
If the bad thing doesn't happen your confidence is shattered. Now you have to figure out why things worked anyway despite your predictions.
If the bad thing does happen exactly as you expected it to, you've just wasted a test. You were already confident that something bad would happen and it did. Congratulations?
Full scale tests should be done to discover the things you don't already know about.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 8:41 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
If the bad thing doesn't happen your confidence is shattered. Now you have to figure out why things worked anyway despite your predictions.
If the bad thing does happen exactly as you expected it to, you've just wasted a test. You were already confident that something bad would happen and it did. Congratulations?
Full scale tests should be done to discover the things you don't already know about.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 8:41 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
It seemed to go pretty well for a first try at launching a 5,000 ton object into space. Perfection would have been nice, but they got a ton of real-world flight data.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:41 AM on April 20, 2023 [18 favorites]
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:41 AM on April 20, 2023 [18 favorites]
Rapid unscheduled disassembly is what my toddler does to electronics.
posted by saturday_morning at 8:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by saturday_morning at 8:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [15 favorites]
"Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly" is actually pretty much the standard term for this, and one that's been used for quite some time, potentially all the way back to the 60s.
posted by Four Ds at 8:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [17 favorites]
posted by Four Ds at 8:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [17 favorites]
The WaPo's early story had this beautifully oblivious and ironic quote, given Musk's other role as Chief Destruction Officer at Twitter:
If the rocket gets “far enough away from the launchpad before something goes wrong, then I think I would consider that to be a success,” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said before the flight. “Just don’t blow up the launchpad.”
posted by martin q blank at 8:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
If the rocket gets “far enough away from the launchpad before something goes wrong, then I think I would consider that to be a success,” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said before the flight. “Just don’t blow up the launchpad.”
posted by martin q blank at 8:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
He didn’t seem to have much of a launch damper system, but I’m not sure how much of those playing chunks in the video tclark posted were parts the launchpad and how many were stray rocks thrown from the surrounding landscape by the air current/pressure wave
posted by Jon_Evil at 8:44 AM on April 20, 2023
posted by Jon_Evil at 8:44 AM on April 20, 2023
Maybe it's because I've had those clips of NASA launches ingrained into my brain that always showed cool, calm, adults taking everything so seriously--you know as professionals do. I swear even a group of grade school children wouldn't be this overexcited and rowdy.
The cheering and whooping was coming from the people who built the thing, not mission control. You can hear their cool, calm, adult voices on the radio.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:44 AM on April 20, 2023 [31 favorites]
The cheering and whooping was coming from the people who built the thing, not mission control. You can hear their cool, calm, adult voices on the radio.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:44 AM on April 20, 2023 [31 favorites]
Apparently the stage separation mechanism is trying to use the flip (which the booster wants to do anyway in order to start the boostback burn to return to land) to replace a "pusher" mechanism. The booster starts the rotation, clamps release, the stages move apart because of their angular momentum and less moving parts are required. In light of that, the spinning out of control is more like one flip that was intentional, and then separation failed, and then the momentum just continued until the FTS blew it up - probably when it reached the edge of the designated launch corridor.
The booster flying with a bunch of engines out was incredibly reminiscent of the Soviet N1. Although the N1 was a complete failure that's not necessarily a deal-breaker as 1970 technology was a lot less capable at controlling so many engines and figuring out how to handle an engine failure, and having the telemetry to figure out what happened. The space industry has 50 years of institutional belief that "30+ engines will never work" but they were saying that before the Falcon Heavy launched with 27 engines which seems to work quite reliably.
posted by allegedly at 8:45 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
The booster flying with a bunch of engines out was incredibly reminiscent of the Soviet N1. Although the N1 was a complete failure that's not necessarily a deal-breaker as 1970 technology was a lot less capable at controlling so many engines and figuring out how to handle an engine failure, and having the telemetry to figure out what happened. The space industry has 50 years of institutional belief that "30+ engines will never work" but they were saying that before the Falcon Heavy launched with 27 engines which seems to work quite reliably.
posted by allegedly at 8:45 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
To be clear, I don't have a problem with a test flight not succeeding. It is a test, after all.
But I have two major issues with how things went down today:
1) Range safety. The MOMENT you know you've lost control, you need to blow the rocket up. You don't know how long you have before something else goes wrong and prevents you from blowing the rocket up if you really really need to blow it up. This is the job of the Range Safety Officer. This wasn't done.
2) Launchpad safety. Sure, trenches and water suppression systems are expensive and uncool, but it's never a good idea to turn the concrete slab under your launch platform into tons of flying shrapnel.
Both of these things are super bad things and also things SpaceX has total control over, no matter how a test goes.
posted by tclark at 8:47 AM on April 20, 2023 [104 favorites]
But I have two major issues with how things went down today:
1) Range safety. The MOMENT you know you've lost control, you need to blow the rocket up. You don't know how long you have before something else goes wrong and prevents you from blowing the rocket up if you really really need to blow it up. This is the job of the Range Safety Officer. This wasn't done.
2) Launchpad safety. Sure, trenches and water suppression systems are expensive and uncool, but it's never a good idea to turn the concrete slab under your launch platform into tons of flying shrapnel.
Both of these things are super bad things and also things SpaceX has total control over, no matter how a test goes.
posted by tclark at 8:47 AM on April 20, 2023 [104 favorites]
If the rocket gets “far enough away from the launchpad before something goes wrong, then I think I would consider that to be a success,”
I wonder if Tom Lehrer can work that quote into an updated song....
posted by RonButNotStupid at 8:47 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
I wonder if Tom Lehrer can work that quote into an updated song....
posted by RonButNotStupid at 8:47 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
ugh this fucken guy
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:48 AM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:48 AM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
I hate to root against a new rocket, but I hate to root for anything Musk will take credit for. So I’ll just leave this here.
posted by rikschell at 8:49 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by rikschell at 8:49 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
That's the coolest thing I remember about the launches of yore, is the incredible suppression systems, the absolutely massive trenches, the water pumps as big as your car, the big clouds of steam and just the FOOOOSH of the massive clouds of deflected, cooled exhaust and steam shooting safely sideways. Rocket went up, yeah, but reaction byproducts rendered harmless is also a tremendous engineering feat.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:52 AM on April 20, 2023 [44 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:52 AM on April 20, 2023 [44 favorites]
Irritated with every press article repeating "Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly" like it is some clever new phrase. I know it mostly as a joke from the Kerbal Space Program community but it's much older military slang, going back to the 60s at least. Harumph.
posted by Nelson at 8:56 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
posted by Nelson at 8:56 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
Listening to all that cheering and whooping while the rocket is still sitting on the launchpad just makes me think that this is the opposite of a professional organization.
I mean, the giant corpo tech company I work for has pleeeeeenty of brown nosing everywhere all the time anytime there's a public showing of any kind so I feel like this is just par for the course for corpo-America identity cooptation of formerly church/community culture for the sake of furthering the ability to exploit workers
posted by paimapi at 8:56 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
I mean, the giant corpo tech company I work for has pleeeeeenty of brown nosing everywhere all the time anytime there's a public showing of any kind so I feel like this is just par for the course for corpo-America identity cooptation of formerly church/community culture for the sake of furthering the ability to exploit workers
posted by paimapi at 8:56 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
It’s 4/20, and the world's biggest blunt was a wipeout.
posted by njohnson23 at 8:57 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
posted by njohnson23 at 8:57 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
I hate how everyone is primed to hate this rocket launch. With reason; Elon Musk is a terrible person. But I like the audacity of this company's engineering! I like space development! I am literally writing this post via Starlink and am hoping they get Starship working so they can expand capacity.
Worth noting while Musk is the occasional front man for SpaceX it is Gwynne Shotwell who runs the company and is responsible for its day to day successes and failures. And there's a giant staff of engineers and space nerds there doing great work, literally redefining the market for launch services. I want them to succeed. And from what I've read this launch was mostly a success in that they accomplished their primary goal. It's a shame about the stretch goal but they're getting there.
One detail I'm curious about; how many of the 33 rockets can fail but the launch still succeed? It looked as many as 6 failed at various times, this screenshot shows 5 out. Worse they're all on one side. May that have contributed to the loss of control?
posted by Nelson at 8:57 AM on April 20, 2023 [35 favorites]
Worth noting while Musk is the occasional front man for SpaceX it is Gwynne Shotwell who runs the company and is responsible for its day to day successes and failures. And there's a giant staff of engineers and space nerds there doing great work, literally redefining the market for launch services. I want them to succeed. And from what I've read this launch was mostly a success in that they accomplished their primary goal. It's a shame about the stretch goal but they're getting there.
One detail I'm curious about; how many of the 33 rockets can fail but the launch still succeed? It looked as many as 6 failed at various times, this screenshot shows 5 out. Worse they're all on one side. May that have contributed to the loss of control?
posted by Nelson at 8:57 AM on April 20, 2023 [35 favorites]
I mean, the giant corpo tech company I work for has pleeeeeenty of brown nosing everywhere all the time anytime there's a public showing of any kind
Yeah, the last time I was at a public corporate celebration-type event where a lot of employees were going to be on camera, they specifically told us before they started filming to act super excited and also to applaud when prompted by the type of flashing "Applause" sign I had previously seen only in Aladdin.
posted by trig at 8:59 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Yeah, the last time I was at a public corporate celebration-type event where a lot of employees were going to be on camera, they specifically told us before they started filming to act super excited and also to applaud when prompted by the type of flashing "Applause" sign I had previously seen only in Aladdin.
posted by trig at 8:59 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
So what happened here is that the front was supposed to fall off, but didn't.
posted by automatronic at 9:01 AM on April 20, 2023 [28 favorites]
posted by automatronic at 9:01 AM on April 20, 2023 [28 favorites]
not mission control. You can hear their cool, calm, adult voices
Can't find it on Youtube but I recall one of these Apollo miniseries-documentaries that had audio of excited, exuberant engineers during the unmanned launch of Apollo 4, the first full-stack test of the Saturn V, in late 1967. ("Yeah, yeah, look at it go!") However, you can hear Walter kinda losing it in that clip.
posted by Rash at 9:03 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Can't find it on Youtube but I recall one of these Apollo miniseries-documentaries that had audio of excited, exuberant engineers during the unmanned launch of Apollo 4, the first full-stack test of the Saturn V, in late 1967. ("Yeah, yeah, look at it go!") However, you can hear Walter kinda losing it in that clip.
posted by Rash at 9:03 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Small request: It's totally possible to talk about SpaceX or this launch without pulling the extremely unlikable CEO of the company into things.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 9:05 AM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 9:05 AM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
If you're pretty sure something bad is going to happen during a test to the point where you're diminishing expectations before the test, why bother testing?
There's a certain point where testing is the most cost-effective thing to do in terms of improving the technology. Simulations and limited test are always distorted and unrealistic, and worse, you don't always know how they are distorted or unrealistic.
It is always a judgement call where that line is, when you need to do more modelling and bench-tests vs going pilot scale. I don't know enough to know if this was appropriate in this case or not. But at some point there is no better way to get better at something that to try it for real, even if you know there's a decent chance of failure. Or better put, things not going as you anticipated, based on your inputs. I do lab to real-world scale ups fairly routinely in my work and it's always a learning experience, often a major opportunity to improve theory and practice.
Not allowing yourself to fail is a sure path to never succeeding, imo. Just look at the other major US effort to get to space and how rapidly that "error free" effort is going.
posted by bonehead at 9:05 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
There's a certain point where testing is the most cost-effective thing to do in terms of improving the technology. Simulations and limited test are always distorted and unrealistic, and worse, you don't always know how they are distorted or unrealistic.
It is always a judgement call where that line is, when you need to do more modelling and bench-tests vs going pilot scale. I don't know enough to know if this was appropriate in this case or not. But at some point there is no better way to get better at something that to try it for real, even if you know there's a decent chance of failure. Or better put, things not going as you anticipated, based on your inputs. I do lab to real-world scale ups fairly routinely in my work and it's always a learning experience, often a major opportunity to improve theory and practice.
Not allowing yourself to fail is a sure path to never succeeding, imo. Just look at the other major US effort to get to space and how rapidly that "error free" effort is going.
posted by bonehead at 9:05 AM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
> It’s 4/20, and the world's biggest blunt was a wipeout.
On the other hand, nothing says "blaze it" like setting fire to 5000 tons of methalox.
posted by automatronic at 9:06 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
On the other hand, nothing says "blaze it" like setting fire to 5000 tons of methalox.
posted by automatronic at 9:06 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
"it does not appear to be a nominal situation"
posted by philip-random at 9:07 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by philip-random at 9:07 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
I've got to say, the person with probably the best information about where the rocket is and where it's going is the range safety officer. It was moving pretty ballistically once it started spinning and letting it go a bit downrange before pushing the button may absolutely have been the correct choice. I'm not going to second-guess them.
Anyway, thumbs up for a pretty sweet achievement, thumbs sideways for the "it's an honor just to be nominated" framing, and thumbs down on Musk, because that guy.
posted by phooky at 9:10 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Anyway, thumbs up for a pretty sweet achievement, thumbs sideways for the "it's an honor just to be nominated" framing, and thumbs down on Musk, because that guy.
posted by phooky at 9:10 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
I mean, the giant corpo tech company I work for has pleeeeeenty of brown nosing everywhere all the time anytime there's a public showing of any kind
Really? You think people who spent years of their lives building an extremely complex 5,000 ton behemoth and are watching the culmination of all their work need some sort of ulterior motive to be excited?
I've been part of engineering teams who have cheered for a lot less, even with no cameras present. There is no dopamine hit like watching shit you've made actually work in the field.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 9:11 AM on April 20, 2023 [38 favorites]
Really? You think people who spent years of their lives building an extremely complex 5,000 ton behemoth and are watching the culmination of all their work need some sort of ulterior motive to be excited?
I've been part of engineering teams who have cheered for a lot less, even with no cameras present. There is no dopamine hit like watching shit you've made actually work in the field.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 9:11 AM on April 20, 2023 [38 favorites]
Small request: It's totally possible to talk about SpaceX or this launch without pulling the extremely unlikable CEO of the company into things.
Up until approximately November last year, Elon was formally in charge of Starship/Super Heavy development, not Shotwell, so I think it actually is relevant.
posted by tclark at 9:12 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
Up until approximately November last year, Elon was formally in charge of Starship/Super Heavy development, not Shotwell, so I think it actually is relevant.
posted by tclark at 9:12 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
However, you can hear Walter kinda losing it in that clip.
But Cronkite was on CBS, and that's NBC coverage! Here's his live Apollo 4 report.
posted by Rash at 9:14 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
But Cronkite was on CBS, and that's NBC coverage! Here's his live Apollo 4 report.
posted by Rash at 9:14 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
I'll wait to hear what Big Jim McBob and Billy Sol Hurok have to say about the launch.
posted by Devoidoid at 9:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Devoidoid at 9:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
The cheering and whooping was coming from the people who built the thing, not mission control. You can hear their cool, calm, adult voices on the radio.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:44 AM on April 20
Yes, but this was still the voice overlay that dominated the audio portion of the transmission so it was distracting.
Additionally, I realize these people made it and were excited for the test, but it's still premature celebration. The rocket could have blown up on the launchpad while they were cheering like idiots. That wasn't the point for cheering. I get being excited and nervous and tense and all of those other emotions, but it really feels like we've lost the ability--or desire--to regulate our responses as a society. It's not even instant gratification, it's anticipatory gratification.
Maybe it's just me, but I wait to celebrate until I know there is actually something to celebrate. I always believe that just because things are going fine now, it doesn't mean they won't go off the rails two seconds from now.
As a couple of people have pointed out upthread, there seems to be this current need for corporate-applause monkeys at any and every event. People to stand behind the big man (which I've always felt was so rude--turning your back on people is not a sign of respect) and clap and shout and brainlessly parrot slogans and cheers. It's a pretty sad commentary on society that we can't even wait for genuine reactions and emotions. They all have to cued and scripted and over the top.
posted by sardonyx at 9:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:44 AM on April 20
Yes, but this was still the voice overlay that dominated the audio portion of the transmission so it was distracting.
Additionally, I realize these people made it and were excited for the test, but it's still premature celebration. The rocket could have blown up on the launchpad while they were cheering like idiots. That wasn't the point for cheering. I get being excited and nervous and tense and all of those other emotions, but it really feels like we've lost the ability--or desire--to regulate our responses as a society. It's not even instant gratification, it's anticipatory gratification.
Maybe it's just me, but I wait to celebrate until I know there is actually something to celebrate. I always believe that just because things are going fine now, it doesn't mean they won't go off the rails two seconds from now.
As a couple of people have pointed out upthread, there seems to be this current need for corporate-applause monkeys at any and every event. People to stand behind the big man (which I've always felt was so rude--turning your back on people is not a sign of respect) and clap and shout and brainlessly parrot slogans and cheers. It's a pretty sad commentary on society that we can't even wait for genuine reactions and emotions. They all have to cued and scripted and over the top.
posted by sardonyx at 9:17 AM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
It's also relevant to note that SpaceX has something like 3 boosters and 5 starships in various stages of construction (I forget whether that was including or not including the one that launched). This is not like the SLS where they have one rocket and if anything goes wrong it'll take a couple years and a gajillion dollars to build another one. The initial expectation was for another test in a couple months.
However, pictures are now coming out showing significant damage around the pad from debris being blasted out from under the rocket - that could be more of a setback if they have to rebuild the pad with a flame trench.
posted by allegedly at 9:20 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
However, pictures are now coming out showing significant damage around the pad from debris being blasted out from under the rocket - that could be more of a setback if they have to rebuild the pad with a flame trench.
posted by allegedly at 9:20 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
If the rocket gets “far enough away from the launchpad before something goes wrong, then I think I would consider that to be a success,”
So the operation was a success but the patient died?
posted by Paul Slade at 9:21 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
So the operation was a success but the patient died?
posted by Paul Slade at 9:21 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
So what happened here is that the front was supposed to fall off, but didn't.
Well, they planned to tow the ship outside the environment.
posted by nathan_teske at 9:22 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Well, they planned to tow the ship outside the environment.
posted by nathan_teske at 9:22 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
I honestly thought they added a pre-recorded applause track to the beginning and started wondering if Elon had fired half the staff.
posted by Lanark at 9:25 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Lanark at 9:25 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Oh yeah, SpaceX lands rockets on Culture named barges in the ocean or back at the launch site every so often. Do you remember them? Nope, fucking return to Earth to be reused rockets you forget.
Are you pissed because you don't like Musk, yep, burn him at the stake. Did you watch the 1-10 failures to land that ended in "BOOM" before they got it right? They showed that on the stream. Rockets are giant bombs that eventually people get strapped on top of. Failure is an option and best to have before you put people on it.
posted by zengargoyle at 9:26 AM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
Are you pissed because you don't like Musk, yep, burn him at the stake. Did you watch the 1-10 failures to land that ended in "BOOM" before they got it right? They showed that on the stream. Rockets are giant bombs that eventually people get strapped on top of. Failure is an option and best to have before you put people on it.
posted by zengargoyle at 9:26 AM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
"Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly" is actually pretty much the standard term for this, and one that's been used for quite some time, potentially all the way back to the 60s.
It's still the day I learned it, and it's a really nice phrase. I have it over my desk now.
posted by warriorqueen at 9:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
It's still the day I learned it, and it's a really nice phrase. I have it over my desk now.
posted by warriorqueen at 9:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Odd place to fail. I'd have guessed max Q or stage 2 ignition would be more likely. I suppose something got bent by all the tumbling.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 9:28 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 9:28 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
1) Range safety. The MOMENT you know you've lost control, you need to blow the rocket up. You don't know how long you have before something else goes wrong and prevents you from blowing the rocket up if you really really need to blow it up. This is the job of the Range Safety Officer. This wasn't done.
There was a exclusion zone for this, and it's pretty big. If a ship had entered this zone, the launch would be cancelled. The Range Safety Officer did it's job.
posted by Pendragon at 9:30 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
There was a exclusion zone for this, and it's pretty big. If a ship had entered this zone, the launch would be cancelled. The Range Safety Officer did it's job.
posted by Pendragon at 9:30 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
Is the Space X pad really close to the VAB relative to the Saturn launch pads or even Baikonur facilities or is it just perspective?
posted by Mitheral at 9:30 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Mitheral at 9:30 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
As a couple of people have pointed out upthread, there seems to be this current need for corporate-applause monkeys at any and every event.
I feel sad for people who have to work at companies like that. But, not all of us work at terrible places.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 9:32 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
I feel sad for people who have to work at companies like that. But, not all of us work at terrible places.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 9:32 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Listening to all that cheering and whooping while the rocket is still sitting on the launchpad just makes me think that this is the opposite of a professional organization.
To me it was 'hey um guys, why are you cheering before the damn thing even got started?'
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 9:33 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
To me it was 'hey um guys, why are you cheering before the damn thing even got started?'
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 9:33 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Jesus the cheering sounds like a Scientology gathering with David Miscavige spouting off something unhinged
posted by glaucon at 9:34 AM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by glaucon at 9:34 AM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
Maybe it's just me, but I wait to celebrate until I know there is actually something to celebrate.
At a bunch of points in the countdown there is something to celebrate. The biggest indicator of this I noticed on this launch was the swell of applause when the clock passes -:40. The place goes quiet very fast when it jumps back to -:40 because they were all thinking it would hold and then it didn't. Then it did. Then when it actually restarted the excitement built back up. There are many things the people in that room are watching that are cause to celebrate. The fuel filling valve closing properly might not seem like much to go wild over, but if you designed part of that system and then it worked like you planned/hoped and the rest of the big machine could keep moving toward launch, you might be a little cheery too.
Though I agree that it does feel like a bit much to me too every time I watch a SpaceX launch.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 9:38 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
At a bunch of points in the countdown there is something to celebrate. The biggest indicator of this I noticed on this launch was the swell of applause when the clock passes -:40. The place goes quiet very fast when it jumps back to -:40 because they were all thinking it would hold and then it didn't. Then it did. Then when it actually restarted the excitement built back up. There are many things the people in that room are watching that are cause to celebrate. The fuel filling valve closing properly might not seem like much to go wild over, but if you designed part of that system and then it worked like you planned/hoped and the rest of the big machine could keep moving toward launch, you might be a little cheery too.
Though I agree that it does feel like a bit much to me too every time I watch a SpaceX launch.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 9:38 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
Small request: It's totally possible to talk about SpaceX or this launch without pulling the extremely unlikable CEO of the company into things.
I don't mind the casual Musk hate (fuck that guy), but the motivated commenting in here is silly. Folks really are finding at everything Musk-related for things that are Bad. Oh this rocket blew up? Well DUH Musk was always stupid. Those folks cheering? Either corporate plants or children. CLEARLY no Range Safety Officer, b/c Musk bad! etc. etc.
This is, to be sure, bog-standard human behavior but it makes the thread basically full of misplaced schadenfreude and overall low on nuance and high on motivated reasoning.
ETA: the nitpicking around when folks were cheering is hilarious me to me, and another clearly motivated-angle. If Musk was a good guy doing actual good works in the world and also did these rockets, we'd be all geeked at how enthusiastic and, yes, childlike, those engineers were.
posted by wemayfreeze at 9:38 AM on April 20, 2023 [40 favorites]
I don't mind the casual Musk hate (fuck that guy), but the motivated commenting in here is silly. Folks really are finding at everything Musk-related for things that are Bad. Oh this rocket blew up? Well DUH Musk was always stupid. Those folks cheering? Either corporate plants or children. CLEARLY no Range Safety Officer, b/c Musk bad! etc. etc.
This is, to be sure, bog-standard human behavior but it makes the thread basically full of misplaced schadenfreude and overall low on nuance and high on motivated reasoning.
ETA: the nitpicking around when folks were cheering is hilarious me to me, and another clearly motivated-angle. If Musk was a good guy doing actual good works in the world and also did these rockets, we'd be all geeked at how enthusiastic and, yes, childlike, those engineers were.
posted by wemayfreeze at 9:38 AM on April 20, 2023 [40 favorites]
'hey um guys, why are you cheering before the damn thing even got started?'
There are delays between multiple sources of video and audio. You should try watching Gymnastics sometime when the crowd goes wild over a score that you haven't seen yet.
posted by zengargoyle at 9:40 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
There are delays between multiple sources of video and audio. You should try watching Gymnastics sometime when the crowd goes wild over a score that you haven't seen yet.
posted by zengargoyle at 9:40 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
There are delays between multiple sources of video and audio
I guess.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 9:43 AM on April 20, 2023
I guess.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 9:43 AM on April 20, 2023
Gwynne Shotwell who runs the company and is responsible for its day to day successes and failures.
There's a fair amount of investor and NASA sentiment that holds that Shotwell should be CEO and probably will be if Elon carries on ostentatiously burning his public image.
posted by jaduncan at 9:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
There's a fair amount of investor and NASA sentiment that holds that Shotwell should be CEO and probably will be if Elon carries on ostentatiously burning his public image.
posted by jaduncan at 9:43 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
Didn’t this big success spew a bunch of chemicals and toxic debris everywhere? Oh wait, successful tax write-off! At some point they may have known this was a sinking ship but decided to launch it to recoup their losses “unexpectedly”.
posted by waving at 9:44 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by waving at 9:44 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
1) Range safety. The MOMENT you know you've lost control, you need to blow the rocket up. You don't know how long you have before something else goes wrong and prevents you from blowing the rocket up if you really really need to blow it up. This is the job of the Range Safety Officer. This wasn't done.
Does anyone here actually know this to be true?
posted by 2N2222 at 9:44 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
Sound travels more slowly than light, so if anything the cheers should be late.
posted by Lanark at 9:45 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Lanark at 9:45 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Broadcasters have a 3 second delay for producers to hit the mute button, this is synced and delayed to the video, crowd noise.... not so much.
posted by zengargoyle at 9:49 AM on April 20, 2023
posted by zengargoyle at 9:49 AM on April 20, 2023
1) Range safety. The MOMENT you know you've lost control, you need to blow the rocket up. You don't know how long you have before something else goes wrong and prevents you from blowing the rocket up if you really really need to blow it up. This is the job of the Range Safety Officer. This wasn't done.
Does anyone here actually know this to be true?--2N2222
It has been a long while since I worked in the industry but I think Pendragon has it right. Range safety did its job. There's a safety corridor, and as long as it is flying in that corridor, it can do whatever it wants, including backflips. Of course they can always decide to terminate the flight earlier, but the requirement is if it gets to the edge of the corridor.
The concept is this: the corridor size is designed in such a way so that if it gets to the edge and thrust is eliminated, then it will fall in a safe area (i.e. not on top of people). (This also means that the Flight Termination System (FTS) doesn't have to 'blow it up', you just have to ensure that all thrust is eliminated. I remember one rocket where they just had it split in half along its length).
posted by eye of newt at 9:57 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
Does anyone here actually know this to be true?--2N2222
It has been a long while since I worked in the industry but I think Pendragon has it right. Range safety did its job. There's a safety corridor, and as long as it is flying in that corridor, it can do whatever it wants, including backflips. Of course they can always decide to terminate the flight earlier, but the requirement is if it gets to the edge of the corridor.
The concept is this: the corridor size is designed in such a way so that if it gets to the edge and thrust is eliminated, then it will fall in a safe area (i.e. not on top of people). (This also means that the Flight Termination System (FTS) doesn't have to 'blow it up', you just have to ensure that all thrust is eliminated. I remember one rocket where they just had it split in half along its length).
posted by eye of newt at 9:57 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
The RSO generally is supposed to hit the destruct button as quickly as possible on uncrewed flights when positive control is lost. The reason for this is because launch vehicles are extremely complex machines whose failure modes are extremely difficult to predict. A failure of control or other telemetry that indicates an abort/destruct is needed can propagate through multiple systems and even render remote abort/destruct inoperable.
Once the separation failure was clear, any delay in destroying the vehicle was an unnecessary risk that the vehicle could stop responding to commands and then retain some sort of aerodynamic flight ability without normal control. When that happens, a rocket can end up anywhere its fuel can take it. This was not some sort of sounding test where the vehicle was doing to ascend and descend within the safety zone, it was an almost orbital (most of the way around the Earth but not quite) flight.
The rocket was tumbling clearly well outside its intended launch profile. Either they didn't send an abort/destruct at all and waited for it to fail on its own, or they waited until multiple tumbles to do so.
It is never good to delay abort/destruct when the vehicle has failed and is not under control.
posted by tclark at 10:03 AM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
Once the separation failure was clear, any delay in destroying the vehicle was an unnecessary risk that the vehicle could stop responding to commands and then retain some sort of aerodynamic flight ability without normal control. When that happens, a rocket can end up anywhere its fuel can take it. This was not some sort of sounding test where the vehicle was doing to ascend and descend within the safety zone, it was an almost orbital (most of the way around the Earth but not quite) flight.
The rocket was tumbling clearly well outside its intended launch profile. Either they didn't send an abort/destruct at all and waited for it to fail on its own, or they waited until multiple tumbles to do so.
It is never good to delay abort/destruct when the vehicle has failed and is not under control.
posted by tclark at 10:03 AM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
There was a exclusion zone for this, and it's pretty big. If a ship had entered this zone, the launch would be cancelled.
The unfortunate consequence: with a small yacht one can DoS launches.
posted by jaduncan at 10:07 AM on April 20, 2023
The unfortunate consequence: with a small yacht one can DoS launches.
posted by jaduncan at 10:07 AM on April 20, 2023
Thanks, OP! I thought this was cool. Not the sort of thing I normally know about. Am also a fan of enthusiasm so I enjoyed the auto. Two thumbs up from me.
posted by Bella Donna at 10:08 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Bella Donna at 10:08 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
The rocket was tumbling clearly well outside its intended launch profile.
The intended launch profile for this rocket was pretty big. If you think this flight was not monitored within a inch of it's life, I don't know what to say. The FAA would be all over that shit.
posted by Pendragon at 10:09 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
The intended launch profile for this rocket was pretty big. If you think this flight was not monitored within a inch of it's life, I don't know what to say. The FAA would be all over that shit.
posted by Pendragon at 10:09 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Didn’t this big success spew a bunch of chemicals and toxic debris everywhere?
Starship is fueled with liquid oxygen and liquid methane, both of which are non-toxic.
If you want to complain about something, you can complain about the CO2 emissions: by my back-of-the-envelope math, one fully-fueled Starship launch emits roughly 2500 tons of CO2, which is comparable to a 737 flying around the world 5 times, or cutting down and burning about half a square mile of forest. It's large, but not astronomically large.
posted by teraflop at 10:11 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Starship is fueled with liquid oxygen and liquid methane, both of which are non-toxic.
If you want to complain about something, you can complain about the CO2 emissions: by my back-of-the-envelope math, one fully-fueled Starship launch emits roughly 2500 tons of CO2, which is comparable to a 737 flying around the world 5 times, or cutting down and burning about half a square mile of forest. It's large, but not astronomically large.
posted by teraflop at 10:11 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Didn’t this big success spew a bunch of chemicals and toxic debris everywhere? Oh wait, successful tax write-off! At some point they may have known this was a sinking ship but decided to launch it to recoup their losses “unexpectedly”.
SpaceX's entire thing is that they will test rockets that they are pretty sure will blow up. The idea is that it's faster and probably cheaper to gather data and fix the blowing up on the next launch rather than engineering it so it will be perfect on the first go. And, well it's worked pretty well so far? They've put a lot of crap into low earth orbit.
They've blown up several iterations of the top stage of the rocket before they got it to fly and land, they even had a little montage of it exploding on the broadcast.
(And while we are talking failures, Boeing's Starliner is both plagued with delays and also has been having embarrassing and unexpected failures recently)
posted by BungaDunga at 10:14 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
SpaceX's entire thing is that they will test rockets that they are pretty sure will blow up. The idea is that it's faster and probably cheaper to gather data and fix the blowing up on the next launch rather than engineering it so it will be perfect on the first go. And, well it's worked pretty well so far? They've put a lot of crap into low earth orbit.
They've blown up several iterations of the top stage of the rocket before they got it to fly and land, they even had a little montage of it exploding on the broadcast.
(And while we are talking failures, Boeing's Starliner is both plagued with delays and also has been having embarrassing and unexpected failures recently)
posted by BungaDunga at 10:14 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
There's a fair amount of investor and NASA sentiment that holds that Shotwell should be CEO and probably will be if Elon carries on ostentatiously burning his public image.
Is there some threshold we haven't reached yet, or is this just not going to happen because of Musk's tight control over SpaceX? Is there enough riding on NASA's contracts that he could potentially be convinced to step down if NASA decided to back out?
Lots of corporations have had to distance themselves from CEOs/founders/employees who have become public relations liabilities. As long as SpaceX has its Sun King CEO-for-life, I don't think it's fair to ignore his behavior while talking about the company. Elon Musk is SpaceX. If he wanted people to focus only on the company's accomplishments, he wouldn't be going on Tucker Carlson.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:15 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
Is there some threshold we haven't reached yet, or is this just not going to happen because of Musk's tight control over SpaceX? Is there enough riding on NASA's contracts that he could potentially be convinced to step down if NASA decided to back out?
Lots of corporations have had to distance themselves from CEOs/founders/employees who have become public relations liabilities. As long as SpaceX has its Sun King CEO-for-life, I don't think it's fair to ignore his behavior while talking about the company. Elon Musk is SpaceX. If he wanted people to focus only on the company's accomplishments, he wouldn't be going on Tucker Carlson.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:15 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
One nines engineering.
posted by Artw at 10:21 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
posted by Artw at 10:21 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
Metafilter: why are you cheering
posted by Nelson at 10:25 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
posted by Nelson at 10:25 AM on April 20, 2023 [14 favorites]
One nines engineering.
Expectations were set around 50/50 so perhaps more like nine fives.
posted by allegedly at 10:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
Expectations were set around 50/50 so perhaps more like nine fives.
posted by allegedly at 10:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
The number of "I know better than the experts at SpaceX / FAA / NASA / etc" folks in this thread are amazing. I guess that the Musk hate is just too powerful. (Yes, he has outlived his usefulness and I suspect that his case of Nobelitis is beyond curable at this point.)
With respect to the range officer "not doing their job," SpaceX switched to an Automated Flight Termination System on the Falcon 9 back in 2017. No human is needed. If it leaves the flight path, it goes boom. The old days of "blow it up asap in case we can't later" is less of an issue since the AFTS is onboard and not some guy at a desk hundreds of miles away.
That said, there are often cases where you don't want it to go boom right away even if the flight is not going exactly to plan. It can be better to let it fall a bit to minimize the debris field. It can also allow you extra time to pull more telemetry for failure analysis. All of this was entered into the system weeks ago.
This was a test flight with a really big exclusion zone to account for all sorts of things going sideways. In normal SpaceX style, the test was setup under the assumption that something would go wrong. The launch was advertised as a "one way or the other, it will be exciting..." Just like the previous hop and belly flop tests. We are talking about a company that crashed a lot of boosters on their path to perfecting the now almost anodyne landing's that we have all seen so many times. (Thinking of which, does anybody want to calculate the carbon footprint savings of being able to reuse 100+ boosters?)
posted by SegFaultCoreDump at 10:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [28 favorites]
With respect to the range officer "not doing their job," SpaceX switched to an Automated Flight Termination System on the Falcon 9 back in 2017. No human is needed. If it leaves the flight path, it goes boom. The old days of "blow it up asap in case we can't later" is less of an issue since the AFTS is onboard and not some guy at a desk hundreds of miles away.
That said, there are often cases where you don't want it to go boom right away even if the flight is not going exactly to plan. It can be better to let it fall a bit to minimize the debris field. It can also allow you extra time to pull more telemetry for failure analysis. All of this was entered into the system weeks ago.
This was a test flight with a really big exclusion zone to account for all sorts of things going sideways. In normal SpaceX style, the test was setup under the assumption that something would go wrong. The launch was advertised as a "one way or the other, it will be exciting..." Just like the previous hop and belly flop tests. We are talking about a company that crashed a lot of boosters on their path to perfecting the now almost anodyne landing's that we have all seen so many times. (Thinking of which, does anybody want to calculate the carbon footprint savings of being able to reuse 100+ boosters?)
posted by SegFaultCoreDump at 10:27 AM on April 20, 2023 [28 favorites]
It's worth pointing out that the Falcon 9 has about as good a safety record as any rocket ever made. SpaceX's rockets blow up during development. They (so far) don't blow up at all once they're in production. That's the whole model: iterate until its perfect, and some of that iteration is done with live tests and big explosions.
posted by BungaDunga at 10:33 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by BungaDunga at 10:33 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
I wish I could root for SpaceX, but I'm legitimately concerned people are going to blow up.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:50 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:50 AM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
The whole thing disgusts me. If we had zero space program, fine, be a billionaire whiz and try this.
It's viscerally awful. The money, the risk. When so much is needed here. On Earth. I hate it.
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:58 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
It's viscerally awful. The money, the risk. When so much is needed here. On Earth. I hate it.
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:58 AM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
jenfullmoon why? I get Musk sucks but spacex's safety record is pretty exemplary. Or do you just mean the inherent risks of manned spaceflight?
posted by Wretch729 at 10:59 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Wretch729 at 10:59 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Starship is fueled with liquid oxygen and liquid methane, both of which are non-toxic.
What are the attitude thrusters using? IIRC the plan is eventually to have methane/oxygen thrusters but can't remember whether this one is cold gas, hypergolics, or methane.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:15 AM on April 20, 2023
What are the attitude thrusters using? IIRC the plan is eventually to have methane/oxygen thrusters but can't remember whether this one is cold gas, hypergolics, or methane.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:15 AM on April 20, 2023
There are delays between multiple sources of video and audio. You should try watching Gymnastics sometime when the crowd goes wild over a score that you haven't seen yet.
Or, because there are as many as six events going on at the same time, that you'll never see because it was amazing but the gymnast isn't a medal contender.
/end derail
posted by Well I never at 11:20 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Or, because there are as many as six events going on at the same time, that you'll never see because it was amazing but the gymnast isn't a medal contender.
/end derail
posted by Well I never at 11:20 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Elon
slams dick in door
Elon fanboys
that was masterful
posted by Ahmad Khani at 11:21 AM on April 20, 2023 [16 favorites]
slams dick in door
Elon fanboys
that was masterful
posted by Ahmad Khani at 11:21 AM on April 20, 2023 [16 favorites]
Small request: It's totally possible to talk about SpaceX or this launch without pulling the extremely unlikable CEO of the company into things.
"rapid unscheduled disassembly"
no
posted by Ahmad Khani at 11:22 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
"rapid unscheduled disassembly"
no
posted by Ahmad Khani at 11:22 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an Earth-shattering kaboom.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:31 AM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by kirkaracha at 11:31 AM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
Elon out here filming a new ending to Koyaanisqatsi
posted by Schmucko at 11:31 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by Schmucko at 11:31 AM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
I assume FAA will review the incident today and if there were violations of the range safety rules or other issues they refuse to approve another launch until those things are corrected.
Also I’d like to remind everyone that NASA’s big Artemis rocket just finished its final test and orbited the moon and is preparing to send a crewed mission to the moon, while Starship hasn’t made it to orbit.
And if people start objecting with Starship is reusable, etc I’ll remind them that NASA flew a reusable space craft for years — the space shuttle. With big payloads there is very little of any cost savings in reuse. In fact sink costs and the desire for those savings can have a negative impact on mission safety and capabilities.
posted by interogative mood at 11:34 AM on April 20, 2023 [10 favorites]
Also I’d like to remind everyone that NASA’s big Artemis rocket just finished its final test and orbited the moon and is preparing to send a crewed mission to the moon, while Starship hasn’t made it to orbit.
And if people start objecting with Starship is reusable, etc I’ll remind them that NASA flew a reusable space craft for years — the space shuttle. With big payloads there is very little of any cost savings in reuse. In fact sink costs and the desire for those savings can have a negative impact on mission safety and capabilities.
posted by interogative mood at 11:34 AM on April 20, 2023 [10 favorites]
The Right Stuff has some pretty rocket funny test failures, but I feel bad for the guy pushing the launch button.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:35 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by kirkaracha at 11:35 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Video of debris from launch, they’ll need to get that under control.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:37 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:37 AM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
I honestly cannot trust that working for that company would be safe with that guy running it. I know BrandonBlatcher doesn't want to discuss that, and I get it, but that company and its goals are tainted for me because that guy is running it, and I've seen how things are going with Twitter and Tesla.
And now I will tactfully bow out of this thread, and I apologize.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:39 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
And now I will tactfully bow out of this thread, and I apologize.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:39 AM on April 20, 2023 [11 favorites]
I've been trying to find the rocket explosion montage from extremely overlooked 80's anime The Wings of Honnêamise
posted by Jacen at 11:42 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Jacen at 11:42 AM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
I honestly cannot trust that working for that company would be safe with that guy running it.
I get where you're coming from and don't disagree exactly but I worry more for the people on SLS / Orion / Starliner since those seem much more tightly plugged into the networks of contractors and administrators that led to Challenger and Columbia. Like, spacex might just egregiously fuck up, but SLS etc seem way more likely to slowly bleed into really unacceptable levels of endemic risk... like the same admins and contractors have done before.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:48 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
I get where you're coming from and don't disagree exactly but I worry more for the people on SLS / Orion / Starliner since those seem much more tightly plugged into the networks of contractors and administrators that led to Challenger and Columbia. Like, spacex might just egregiously fuck up, but SLS etc seem way more likely to slowly bleed into really unacceptable levels of endemic risk... like the same admins and contractors have done before.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:48 AM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
ArsTechnica weighs in:
For those who know a bit more about the launch industry and the iterative design methodology, getting the Super Heavy rocket and Starship upper stage off the launch pad was a huge success.posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:48 AM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
Why? Because one could sit in meetings for ages and discuss everything that could go wrong with a rocket like this, with an unprecedented number of first stage engines and its colossal size. The alternative is simply to get the rocket into a "good enough" configuration and go fly. Flying is the ultimate test, providing the best data. There is no more worrying about theoretical failures. The company's engineers actually get to identify what is wrong and then go and fix it. But you have to accept some failure.
So SpaceX's process is messier, but it is also much faster. Consider this: NASA spent billions of dollars and the better part of a decade constructing the Space Launch System rocket that had a nearly flawless debut flight—aside from damage to the launch tower—in late 2022. NASA followed a linear design method, complete with extensive and expensive analysis, because a failure of the SLS rocket would have raised serious questions about the agency's competence.
Fortunately for SpaceX, the company can afford to "fail." It can do so because it has already built three more Super Heavy rockets that are nearly ready to fly. In fact, SpaceX can build 10 Super Heavy first stages in the time it takes NASA to build a single SLS rocket. If the first five fail but the next five succeed, which is a better outcome? How about in two or three years, when SpaceX is launching and landing a dozen or more Super Heavy rockets while NASA's method allows it a single launch a year?
I'm still confused about why Reebok is trying to launch rockets
posted by srboisvert at 11:51 AM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by srboisvert at 11:51 AM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
I get the arguments for "fail fast" and understand that Falcon 9 shows how successful that approach can be, but when I hear SpaceX or its fans prematurely declaring victory, I think it's important to recall that the Soviet space program produced the extraordinarily reliable Soyuz rocket (1,700+ launches!), and yet failed to produce a reliable N1 moon rocket, which was notable among other things for having 30 engines in the first stage...
posted by The Tensor at 12:01 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by The Tensor at 12:01 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Like, spacex might just egregiously fuck up, but SLS etc seem way more likely to slowly bleed into really unacceptable levels of endemic risk... like the same admins and contractors have done before.
Amen. It's not that "private industry does it better", but the entrenched NASA contractor pipeline has a demonstrated history of safety failures, and it's not clear that anything has changed.
posted by mr_roboto at 12:03 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
Amen. It's not that "private industry does it better", but the entrenched NASA contractor pipeline has a demonstrated history of safety failures, and it's not clear that anything has changed.
posted by mr_roboto at 12:03 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
The cheering that happened when the rocket was still on the pad occurred as the countdown passed through various hold point thresholds, like 2 minutes, 1 minute, and when they thought it passed through 40 seconds (but it was held then). Those were big milestones that indicated that the launch sequence was proceeding normally.
posted by zsazsa at 12:08 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by zsazsa at 12:08 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Interesting speculations at r/space. Summarizing for people for who don't want to go to reddit:
*The first couple of engines may have been taken out by concrete
*You can see what seems to be a hydraulic unit explode, taking out thrust vectoring for a cluster of engines
*This specific thing won't be a problem going forward as more recent builds use electric gimbals
*It seemed to lose more hydraulics and so more thrust vector control, leading to the cartwheel when the remaining systems couldn't manage any more
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 12:14 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
*The first couple of engines may have been taken out by concrete
*You can see what seems to be a hydraulic unit explode, taking out thrust vectoring for a cluster of engines
*This specific thing won't be a problem going forward as more recent builds use electric gimbals
*It seemed to lose more hydraulics and so more thrust vector control, leading to the cartwheel when the remaining systems couldn't manage any more
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 12:14 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Just a reminder (why do we have to do this in every space thread?) that the term of art for missions with crew is crewed spaceflight, not “manned,” and has been for many, many years.
posted by rikschell at 12:22 PM on April 20, 2023 [29 favorites]
posted by rikschell at 12:22 PM on April 20, 2023 [29 favorites]
Flying is the ultimate test, providing the best data. There is no more worrying about theoretical failures.
That makes sense up to a point. But you still have to worry plenty about theoretical failures, unless you plan to be doing thousands of test launches. A single test flight gives you a single, very partial, set of data points. (I know, I know, this was written by a journalist and not an engineer, but the criticisms of 'move fast and break things' aren't about the speed in and of itself.)
(I also strongly think discussing Musk is relevant, because SpaceX is part of what makes him powerful and I can't not be wary of powerful people with a track record of using that power extremely badly. Especially when they've also demonstrated their interest in affecting politics. Also, because however impressive SpaceX's achievements are, if he's the one deciding what use those achievements are going to be put to then it's harder (for me) to be optimistic than it might be if this were, say, the European Space Agency. I feel like the past decade has broken my ability to just cheer things on without thinking about how they're liable to play out. But I appreciate that that's not universal. Maybe both approaches can coexist in this thread, and we can tolerate the parts we don't like.)
posted by trig at 12:32 PM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
That makes sense up to a point. But you still have to worry plenty about theoretical failures, unless you plan to be doing thousands of test launches. A single test flight gives you a single, very partial, set of data points. (I know, I know, this was written by a journalist and not an engineer, but the criticisms of 'move fast and break things' aren't about the speed in and of itself.)
(I also strongly think discussing Musk is relevant, because SpaceX is part of what makes him powerful and I can't not be wary of powerful people with a track record of using that power extremely badly. Especially when they've also demonstrated their interest in affecting politics. Also, because however impressive SpaceX's achievements are, if he's the one deciding what use those achievements are going to be put to then it's harder (for me) to be optimistic than it might be if this were, say, the European Space Agency. I feel like the past decade has broken my ability to just cheer things on without thinking about how they're liable to play out. But I appreciate that that's not universal. Maybe both approaches can coexist in this thread, and we can tolerate the parts we don't like.)
posted by trig at 12:32 PM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
Starship is fueled with liquid oxygen and liquid methane
and sunny delight
posted by flabdablet at 12:33 PM on April 20, 2023
and sunny delight
posted by flabdablet at 12:33 PM on April 20, 2023
Is the Space X pad really close to the VAB relative to the Saturn launch pads or even Baikonur facilities or is it just perspective?This launch was from their facility in Texas, so I am not sure the distance compared to Florida, although I think they are currently stacking the rockets on the pad there.
In terms of the VAB to the Saturn Launch Pad vs SpaceX in Florida, SpaceX is using Launch Pad 39A for current Falcon launches with plans to use it for Starship. This is the same launch pad used for the Saturn V Apollo launches.
posted by Badgermann at 12:34 PM on April 20, 2023
because a failure of the SLS rocket would have raised serious questions about the agency's competence.
Fortunately for SpaceX, the company can afford to "fail."
It's almost like these two organizations are being held to two completely different standards and we're praising the ability of one to do the exact things we would punish the other for doing, even though at the end of the day they're both playing around with taxpayer money*
* In theory SpaceX as a private company probably assumes more financial risk for not delivering a working rocket, but I'd be surprised if some significant portion of their R&D costs weren't being covered by the federal government.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 12:35 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
Fortunately for SpaceX, the company can afford to "fail."
It's almost like these two organizations are being held to two completely different standards and we're praising the ability of one to do the exact things we would punish the other for doing, even though at the end of the day they're both playing around with taxpayer money*
* In theory SpaceX as a private company probably assumes more financial risk for not delivering a working rocket, but I'd be surprised if some significant portion of their R&D costs weren't being covered by the federal government.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 12:35 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
> I also strongly think discussing Musk is relevant, because SpaceX is part of what makes him powerful and I can't not be wary of powerful people with a track record of using that power extremely badly.
i'm a very strong proponent of criticizing grimes's big mistake but as a result i'm a proponent of focused, effective critiques of said mistake rather than broad-band "lololol everything he's spent money on is bad because he's bad" quasi-critique, which tend to backfire when it's applied to something that isn't actually bad.
i would like to stress, though, that the received wisdom that spacex is gwynne shotwell's company and that grimes's big mistake has nothing to do with it is indeed a little glib. i was on team "lol, musk has nothing to do with spacex, thankfully" until that time he went on rogan and claimed that he demanded that starship be pointy, despite that design being marginally less aerodynamic, because pointy rockets look cooler. like, starship is pointy, and pointy is worse here, and if you put that together it suggests that he is in fact not lying or hallucinating when he said they did it that way because he told them to. and which, terrifyingly, suggests that he might be involved in other aspects of the design as well.
i would not be the slightest bit surprised if emails turn up where engineers say they don't want to do the test today because of the number of engines that are already out and where musk demands the launch anyway because 4/20. that would probably be the best possible outcome of this successful — and it's not just spin to call it successful — test, since it would result in a more robust process for keeping that guy's spit-sodden paws off of anything important.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 12:44 PM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
i'm a very strong proponent of criticizing grimes's big mistake but as a result i'm a proponent of focused, effective critiques of said mistake rather than broad-band "lololol everything he's spent money on is bad because he's bad" quasi-critique, which tend to backfire when it's applied to something that isn't actually bad.
i would like to stress, though, that the received wisdom that spacex is gwynne shotwell's company and that grimes's big mistake has nothing to do with it is indeed a little glib. i was on team "lol, musk has nothing to do with spacex, thankfully" until that time he went on rogan and claimed that he demanded that starship be pointy, despite that design being marginally less aerodynamic, because pointy rockets look cooler. like, starship is pointy, and pointy is worse here, and if you put that together it suggests that he is in fact not lying or hallucinating when he said they did it that way because he told them to. and which, terrifyingly, suggests that he might be involved in other aspects of the design as well.
i would not be the slightest bit surprised if emails turn up where engineers say they don't want to do the test today because of the number of engines that are already out and where musk demands the launch anyway because 4/20. that would probably be the best possible outcome of this successful — and it's not just spin to call it successful — test, since it would result in a more robust process for keeping that guy's spit-sodden paws off of anything important.
posted by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 12:44 PM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
Just what the atmosphere needed; a gigantic methane-based explosion blowing up 11,000 pounds of debris in the middle of the stratosphere.
posted by MrVisible at 12:46 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by MrVisible at 12:46 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
To paraphrase Milhouse, first it started blowing up, then it blew up.
posted by tommasz at 12:54 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by tommasz at 12:54 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
spacex's safety record is pretty exemplary
Compared to commercial air travel? Yeah, nah.
posted by flabdablet at 12:57 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Compared to commercial air travel? Yeah, nah.
posted by flabdablet at 12:57 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Relatedly, NASA's own version of the heavy lift rocket, the "Vulcan Centaur", had a recent setback of its own in March and won't launch until June/July at earliest.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 1:05 PM on April 20, 2023
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 1:05 PM on April 20, 2023
"lololol everything he's spent money on is bad because he's bad"
That's not my criticism, though it might be others'. I'm not laughing at the unsuccessful launch. I am worrying about what eventual success might bring. And yeah, I'm glad he didn't get a huge PR victory at this juncture, not because I think "he's bad" but because I expect what he'd use that victory for would be bad.
posted by trig at 1:11 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
That's not my criticism, though it might be others'. I'm not laughing at the unsuccessful launch. I am worrying about what eventual success might bring. And yeah, I'm glad he didn't get a huge PR victory at this juncture, not because I think "he's bad" but because I expect what he'd use that victory for would be bad.
posted by trig at 1:11 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
Eh, I hate Musk but this is good actually.
I mean, not GOOD, but a sign of progress. You don't normally get rockets blowing up unless you're trying something new and different. Remember way back when Space-X was first working on the Falcon series they blew up a fuckton of rockets, rocket engines on test frames, etc.
Because when you try new and different things in rocketry shit blows up sometimes. And that gives you new informaton so you can figurew out what went wrong and fix it.
Musk sucks. This wasn't really great PR but it shows that they're still trying new and interesting things and that process involves making mistakes and rockets blowing up.
posted by sotonohito at 1:17 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
I mean, not GOOD, but a sign of progress. You don't normally get rockets blowing up unless you're trying something new and different. Remember way back when Space-X was first working on the Falcon series they blew up a fuckton of rockets, rocket engines on test frames, etc.
Because when you try new and different things in rocketry shit blows up sometimes. And that gives you new informaton so you can figurew out what went wrong and fix it.
Musk sucks. This wasn't really great PR but it shows that they're still trying new and interesting things and that process involves making mistakes and rockets blowing up.
posted by sotonohito at 1:17 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
The methane yeah, but there wasn't really that much of it, on a climate change scale, and it breaks down in the atmosphere pretty fast. Did you know a cow burps up about 100kg of methane a year? I am pretty sure the rocket wasn't carrying more of a modest feedlot's worth of methane even at launch, and there was only a quarter left at the end I think. Also, it isn't a long-lived toxin or anything. I'm going to categorize it as "awkward, not a big deal."
posted by seanmpuckett at 1:18 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 1:18 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
From reporter Pablo De La Rosa:
Getting reports from multiple people now of “particulates” raining down in areas of Port Isabel after the nearby explosion of the SpaceX rocket stack Starship/Superheavy, 4 minutes after liftoff this morning from Boca Chica in the Rio Grande Valley.
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:23 PM on April 20, 2023 [10 favorites]
Getting reports from multiple people now of “particulates” raining down in areas of Port Isabel after the nearby explosion of the SpaceX rocket stack Starship/Superheavy, 4 minutes after liftoff this morning from Boca Chica in the Rio Grande Valley.
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:23 PM on April 20, 2023 [10 favorites]
It truly annoys me that the dude who owns a tunnel boring company didn’t bore a tunnel below his rocket launchpad. Heck, I would have expected a rocket-propelled flame-throwing digger just for the celebration of gadgetry. SpaceX: We make space Boring.
posted by Callisto Prime at 1:25 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by Callisto Prime at 1:25 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
(yes I know it’s not precisely a tunnel so much as a one-sided closed-form hyperboid or whatever, and yet)
posted by Callisto Prime at 1:27 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Callisto Prime at 1:27 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Also Emma Guevara of the South Texas Environmental Justice Network wrote “What journalists should know before reporting on the SpaceX at Boca Chica Beach”
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:28 PM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
First and foremost, the geography and names of this area get confused purposely, whether it be the journalistic biases, or SpaceX’s own public relations team. There has been a very strategic effort on SpaceX’s, and more specifically Elon Musk’s behalf, to ignore or erase the fact that SpaceX is incredibly close to a community of hundreds of thousands of people. The SpaceX facility is not on another planet; it’s in the middle of major wildlife habitat, on the shores of our beach, and in our community.Impacts on birds :"SpaceX operations continue to damage important coastal bird habitats."
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:28 PM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
Can't find it on Youtube but I recall one of these Apollo miniseries-documentaries that had audio of excited, exuberant engineers during the unmanned launch of Apollo 4, the first full-stack test of the Saturn V, in late 1967. ("Yeah, yeah, look at it go!") However, you can hear Walter kinda losing it in that clip.
posted by Rash at 9:03 AM on April 20 [1 favorite −]
Thanks for that Rash. I'm more than a little annoyed that my childhood fascination with the Apollo Space program is being replaced with people caring about Mr. destroy-twitter Apartheid Man's penis blowing up on weed day. good grief.
posted by bluesky43 at 1:34 PM on April 20, 2023
posted by Rash at 9:03 AM on April 20 [1 favorite −]
Thanks for that Rash. I'm more than a little annoyed that my childhood fascination with the Apollo Space program is being replaced with people caring about Mr. destroy-twitter Apartheid Man's penis blowing up on weed day. good grief.
posted by bluesky43 at 1:34 PM on April 20, 2023
Much of Texas is not suitable terrain for boring
posted by Jacen at 1:34 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Jacen at 1:34 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
This video by Space Beetle analyzes today's launch and specifically takes a look at some of the things that went wrong - including some details you probably didn't notice if you were just casually watching the liftoff, and also some views of the damage/destruction around the launch site.
posted by flug at 1:38 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by flug at 1:38 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Listening to all that cheering and whooping while the rocket is still sitting on the launchpad just makes me think that this is the opposite of a professional organization. Maybe it's because I've had those clips of NASA launches ingrained into my brain that always showed cool, calm, adults taking everything so seriously--you know as professionals do. I swear even a group of grade school children wouldn't be this overexcited and rowdy.
To me the takeaway is the cheering at the end. You know, when the rocket blows up in a spectacular failure and they cheer just as loudly. Musk loves his fanboys, and the cult around SpaceX is perfectly on display here: cheer the boss' rocket, and if it explodes...well, keep cheering because it was a good effort, right? SpaceX, fuck yeah!
It's very culty behavior.
posted by zardoz at 1:49 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
To me the takeaway is the cheering at the end. You know, when the rocket blows up in a spectacular failure and they cheer just as loudly. Musk loves his fanboys, and the cult around SpaceX is perfectly on display here: cheer the boss' rocket, and if it explodes...well, keep cheering because it was a good effort, right? SpaceX, fuck yeah!
It's very culty behavior.
posted by zardoz at 1:49 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
sounds like it was having a bad problem and will not go to space today
If you want to go to space, gotta go fast.
posted by straight at 1:50 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
If you want to go to space, gotta go fast.
posted by straight at 1:50 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Also Emma Guevara of the South Texas Environmental Justice Network wrote “What journalists should know before reporting on the SpaceX at Boca Chica Beach”
Thank you! I knew I had read some stuff about how they were just blowing past any and all ecological impacts but couldn't find it earlier.
The alternative is simply to get the rocket into a "good enough" configuration and go fly. Flying is the ultimate test, providing the best data. There is no more worrying about theoretical failures. The company's engineers actually get to identify what is wrong and then go and fix it. But you have to accept some failure.
Godsdammit the lesson of "move fast and break stuff" is NOT "move fastER and break EVEN BIGGER stuff" it's to STOP DOING THAT.
posted by curious nu at 1:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Thank you! I knew I had read some stuff about how they were just blowing past any and all ecological impacts but couldn't find it earlier.
The alternative is simply to get the rocket into a "good enough" configuration and go fly. Flying is the ultimate test, providing the best data. There is no more worrying about theoretical failures. The company's engineers actually get to identify what is wrong and then go and fix it. But you have to accept some failure.
Godsdammit the lesson of "move fast and break stuff" is NOT "move fastER and break EVEN BIGGER stuff" it's to STOP DOING THAT.
posted by curious nu at 1:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Also I’d like to remind everyone that NASA’s big Artemis rocket just finished its final test and orbited the moon and is preparing to send a crewed mission to the moon, while Starship hasn’t made it to orbit.
And I like to remind you that Starship is part of the Artemis program.
posted by Pendragon at 1:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
And I like to remind you that Starship is part of the Artemis program.
posted by Pendragon at 1:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
It shouldn’t be.
posted by Artw at 2:00 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Artw at 2:00 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
So what you're saying is that it is strange to have all that cheering and whooping from a bunch of mostly very young people who have been working long hours for years building actual fucking space rockets, who have self-selected themselves to be the biggest space nerds imaginable, and are finally getting to see the thing they built fly to space and/or blow up in a giant fireball...
...is this your first time observing human beings in the wild?
posted by allegedly at 2:02 PM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
...is this your first time observing human beings in the wild?
posted by allegedly at 2:02 PM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
It's very culty behavior.
Cheering your rockets' sacrifice for in the pursuit of knowledge seems well within normal for engineers who have spent a decade blowing up rockets in the pursuit of better rockets, and succeeded. Might as well cheer since it's not something to cry over.
Compared to commercial air travel?
Ground-to-ground Starship is a dumb and bad idea. That doesn't mean that SpaceX isn't very good at reliably getting things into orbit, which they are. NASA is flying people on Crew Dragon already.
posted by BungaDunga at 2:03 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Cheering your rockets' sacrifice for in the pursuit of knowledge seems well within normal for engineers who have spent a decade blowing up rockets in the pursuit of better rockets, and succeeded. Might as well cheer since it's not something to cry over.
Compared to commercial air travel?
Ground-to-ground Starship is a dumb and bad idea. That doesn't mean that SpaceX isn't very good at reliably getting things into orbit, which they are. NASA is flying people on Crew Dragon already.
posted by BungaDunga at 2:03 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
It shouldn’t be.
Care to elaborate why ?
Look, being from the Netherlands, I'm ESA all the way. I can't wait for Ariane 6, but all this SpaceX hate seems to be all about Musk, not the technology.
posted by Pendragon at 2:04 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Care to elaborate why ?
Look, being from the Netherlands, I'm ESA all the way. I can't wait for Ariane 6, but all this SpaceX hate seems to be all about Musk, not the technology.
posted by Pendragon at 2:04 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Like, I get the push back on criticism. This did what rockets do in testing now, I guess, hearing from multiple sources.
But we also get to see Elon's management and owner style live on T(w?)itter every damn day. So if someone told me, "Everything is fine, Elon's rocket will be passing over the east coast" I'd take a drive down the Shenandoah.
posted by Slackermagee at 2:04 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
But we also get to see Elon's management and owner style live on T(w?)itter every damn day. So if someone told me, "Everything is fine, Elon's rocket will be passing over the east coast" I'd take a drive down the Shenandoah.
posted by Slackermagee at 2:04 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
I gotta say it's fascinating to see how hatred distorts otherwise reasonable people's perceptions.
posted by some loser at 2:05 PM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by some loser at 2:05 PM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
Godsdammit the lesson of "move fast and break stuff" is NOT "move fastER and break EVEN BIGGER stuff" it's to STOP DOING THAT
Isn't it? SpaceX moved fast and blew up a bunch of Falcon rockets, and now they have a very reliable Falcon rocket. Why not... do that again, but bigger?
posted by BungaDunga at 2:06 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Isn't it? SpaceX moved fast and blew up a bunch of Falcon rockets, and now they have a very reliable Falcon rocket. Why not... do that again, but bigger?
posted by BungaDunga at 2:06 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
The moral of this story is that many of us have embarrassing exuberant noises we make when we achieve something that we've been working hard on, but few of us have those noises posted to YouTube.
posted by straight at 2:10 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by straight at 2:10 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
All I have to say is that a Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly is far better than a Rapid Uncommanded Disassembly.
posted by infinitewindow at 2:15 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by infinitewindow at 2:15 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
"Everything is fine, Elon's rocket will be passing over the east coast" I'd take a drive down the Shenandoah.
There has been precisely one failed Falcon 9 launch. NASA is putting astronauts on them now. They seem to be very good and boring rockets that don't blow up. Don't ask me how Musk didn't manage to enshitten them, but they do appear to work reliably.
I don't know if Starship will work in the end, or if it will be economical, or a success. But let's not pretend that this test wasn't a decent effort and doesn't amount to progress for SpaceX, because it does.
posted by BungaDunga at 2:18 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
There has been precisely one failed Falcon 9 launch. NASA is putting astronauts on them now. They seem to be very good and boring rockets that don't blow up. Don't ask me how Musk didn't manage to enshitten them, but they do appear to work reliably.
I don't know if Starship will work in the end, or if it will be economical, or a success. But let's not pretend that this test wasn't a decent effort and doesn't amount to progress for SpaceX, because it does.
posted by BungaDunga at 2:18 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
I wish all those locals would stop complaining; I’m trying to cheer for myself.
posted by Don.Kinsayder at 2:24 PM on April 20, 2023
posted by Don.Kinsayder at 2:24 PM on April 20, 2023
all this SpaceX hate seems to be all about Musk, not the technology.
Pardon me for not cheering for a hateful right wing asshole who gets to syphon government funds and ignore all externalities.
posted by Artw at 2:28 PM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
Pardon me for not cheering for a hateful right wing asshole who gets to syphon government funds and ignore all externalities.
posted by Artw at 2:28 PM on April 20, 2023 [22 favorites]
So I guess space remains, for now anyway, the one place uncorrupted by capitalism?
posted by Naberius at 2:31 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Naberius at 2:31 PM on April 20, 2023 [4 favorites]
I don't know if Starship will work in the end, or if it will be economical, or a success. But let's not pretend that this test wasn't a decent effort and doesn't amount to progress for SpaceX, because it does.
Progress for SpaceX.. at the expense of who else? Of what else? I'm not arguing whether or not this gets to count as "successful" I'm saying - similar to what Artw just dropped in - the whole company is deeply, deeply suspect, and we should not go YAY SPACE uncritically in 2023.
Space is amazing, the universe is amazing, I want to go out and explore it. Thanks in part to EM, we have to go further out, because they launched so many goddamn satellites they're fucking up terrestrial astronomy.
None of this is politically or morally neutral. Criticism - harsh criticism - is fair for someone who is funded on Apartheid and continues to platform Nazis and have segregated factories for his shitty cars. If SpaceX wants to eject EM and make some restitution, then I guess we can have a just-SpaceX conversation, but that's not the reality we have today.
posted by curious nu at 2:32 PM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
Progress for SpaceX.. at the expense of who else? Of what else? I'm not arguing whether or not this gets to count as "successful" I'm saying - similar to what Artw just dropped in - the whole company is deeply, deeply suspect, and we should not go YAY SPACE uncritically in 2023.
Space is amazing, the universe is amazing, I want to go out and explore it. Thanks in part to EM, we have to go further out, because they launched so many goddamn satellites they're fucking up terrestrial astronomy.
None of this is politically or morally neutral. Criticism - harsh criticism - is fair for someone who is funded on Apartheid and continues to platform Nazis and have segregated factories for his shitty cars. If SpaceX wants to eject EM and make some restitution, then I guess we can have a just-SpaceX conversation, but that's not the reality we have today.
posted by curious nu at 2:32 PM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
SpaceX moved fast and blew up a bunch of Falcon rockets, and now they have a very reliable Falcon rocket. Why not... do that again, but bigger?
So as to avoid littering the world with broken junk and destroying the habitats of living things.
posted by Rev. Irreverent Revenant at 2:43 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
So as to avoid littering the world with broken junk and destroying the habitats of living things.
posted by Rev. Irreverent Revenant at 2:43 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
the whole company is deeply, deeply suspect, and we should not go YAY SPACE uncritically in 2023.
The same could be said for NASA itself. Besides science NASA also has a military function. Let's not forget that NRO requirements drove the shuttle design.
posted by Pendragon at 2:47 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
The same could be said for NASA itself. Besides science NASA also has a military function. Let's not forget that NRO requirements drove the shuttle design.
posted by Pendragon at 2:47 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
I heard comment that this was a very early prototype and there are significantly improved versions finishing construction. Twice as powerful as Saturn V.
Wouldn't it be great if we could move all the dangerous industrial plants that are wrecking the environment somewhere that does not hurt the planet?
If you're worried about a chunk of stainless steel at the bottom of the ocean, well there's a lot of metal from much larger, much more toxic ships all over. It'll probably make a reef that becomes great fishing in a few years.
posted by sammyo at 2:48 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Wouldn't it be great if we could move all the dangerous industrial plants that are wrecking the environment somewhere that does not hurt the planet?
If you're worried about a chunk of stainless steel at the bottom of the ocean, well there's a lot of metal from much larger, much more toxic ships all over. It'll probably make a reef that becomes great fishing in a few years.
posted by sammyo at 2:48 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Sure, Musk leaves an unpleasant odor on everything it comes into contact with, but the team at SpaceX has transformed the space industry in the last ten years with Falcon 9. If they can get Starship so similar reliability on a similar timeframe, it will completely change what is possible for people to do in space. I do think it is important to consider environmental costs of space exploration, but so far I think it is something worth continuing. Also, with reusable rockets and especially using methane for this one, they are probably reducing the relative ecological impact compared to pretty much any other rockets. It's all very exciting, even if this one blew up.
posted by snofoam at 2:55 PM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by snofoam at 2:55 PM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
It's impossible to say anything positive about anything Musk related without sounding exactly like a Twitter reply guy.
posted by grahamparks at 3:02 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by grahamparks at 3:02 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Criticism - harsh criticism - is fair for someone who is funded on Apartheid and continues to platform Nazis and have segregated factories for his shitty cars.
I'm not objecting to people criticizing SpaceX for all those reasons, just that I think the problem is much more likely to be "the best rockets in the world are partially controlled by a megalomaniac racist", rather than "the megalomaniac racist's rockets are unreliable tin cans destined to get people killed." The evidence points to the first one. Which is a huge problem!
posted by BungaDunga at 3:25 PM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
I'm not objecting to people criticizing SpaceX for all those reasons, just that I think the problem is much more likely to be "the best rockets in the world are partially controlled by a megalomaniac racist", rather than "the megalomaniac racist's rockets are unreliable tin cans destined to get people killed." The evidence points to the first one. Which is a huge problem!
posted by BungaDunga at 3:25 PM on April 20, 2023 [12 favorites]
I just felt gratified that I've spent enough time playing KSP that I could correctly identify the "You will not go to space today" moment. Not the explosion, but the point where it was clear the explosion was going to happen. That "it's turning too far!" feeling really translates.
posted by nickmark at 3:26 PM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by nickmark at 3:26 PM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
pixelated boat:
Musk’s unmanned rocket may have exploded but it’s an important first step towards his ultimate goal of exploding a manned rocket
posted by delfin at 3:33 PM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
Musk’s unmanned rocket may have exploded but it’s an important first step towards his ultimate goal of exploding a manned rocket
posted by delfin at 3:33 PM on April 20, 2023 [9 favorites]
very young people who have been working long hours for years building actual fucking space rockets, who have self-selected themselves to be the biggest space nerds imaginable
Okay, I'm going to have to wade in here a bit. I work (as a contractor, which is a whole other issue about loss of Government jobs we can discuss another time) for NASA, and may indeed someday end up having to rely on SpaceX tech to put my satellites up.
But back when Blue Origin was nothing more than an almost blank 1 page ad for new hires, and SpaceX was just getting its feet wet making its own capsule and rockets, I managed to get myself an interview at Blue Origin and a tour at SpaceX, both protected by now expired NDAs.
I had three kids and a secure job at the time, but I did want to see what it would be like to work in this whole new crewed spaceflight industry.
You know what? After seeing their very dot com like business models, I realized there was no way I could seriously pursue those jobs. *My* company had good benefits, stability, and understood the balance between work and family. These two places both looked like the sort of outfit that wanted the best and brightest... Who didn't have kids or plans for kids or the need to leave the workplace.
I made the right choice.
So did both the people I knew working at SpaceX. Both of them had family too, and ended up leaving after very successful stints there.
So yes, *very* young. *Long* hours. And no room for care for employees.
I'll stick with NASA, where the people around me have good personal lives *and* are the biggest space nerds I've ever met. And the smartest too.
posted by Flight Hardware, do not touch at 3:40 PM on April 20, 2023 [44 favorites]
Okay, I'm going to have to wade in here a bit. I work (as a contractor, which is a whole other issue about loss of Government jobs we can discuss another time) for NASA, and may indeed someday end up having to rely on SpaceX tech to put my satellites up.
But back when Blue Origin was nothing more than an almost blank 1 page ad for new hires, and SpaceX was just getting its feet wet making its own capsule and rockets, I managed to get myself an interview at Blue Origin and a tour at SpaceX, both protected by now expired NDAs.
I had three kids and a secure job at the time, but I did want to see what it would be like to work in this whole new crewed spaceflight industry.
You know what? After seeing their very dot com like business models, I realized there was no way I could seriously pursue those jobs. *My* company had good benefits, stability, and understood the balance between work and family. These two places both looked like the sort of outfit that wanted the best and brightest... Who didn't have kids or plans for kids or the need to leave the workplace.
I made the right choice.
So did both the people I knew working at SpaceX. Both of them had family too, and ended up leaving after very successful stints there.
So yes, *very* young. *Long* hours. And no room for care for employees.
I'll stick with NASA, where the people around me have good personal lives *and* are the biggest space nerds I've ever met. And the smartest too.
posted by Flight Hardware, do not touch at 3:40 PM on April 20, 2023 [44 favorites]
Oh yeah, I did a little work with some Starlink people a few years back. Those were some tired looking kids. They were pretty shocked when we knocked off at 6pm and went home.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 3:47 PM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 3:47 PM on April 20, 2023 [7 favorites]
>terrestrial astronomy
satellite internet bandwidth >> butterfly collecting with fancy telescopes
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 3:49 PM on April 20, 2023
satellite internet bandwidth >> butterfly collecting with fancy telescopes
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 3:49 PM on April 20, 2023
MetaFilter: not precisely a tunnel so much as a one-sided closed-form hyperboid.
posted by kirkaracha at 3:53 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by kirkaracha at 3:53 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
an important first step towards his ultimate goal of exploding a manned rocket
this is slowly sapping my sanity. he's already got crewed rockets. A privately funded mission is going up in May! NASA's sending one up in August.
posted by BungaDunga at 4:26 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
this is slowly sapping my sanity. he's already got crewed rockets. A privately funded mission is going up in May! NASA's sending one up in August.
posted by BungaDunga at 4:26 PM on April 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Perhaps now is a good time to go have some fun playing Escape Speed.
posted by eckeric at 4:29 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by eckeric at 4:29 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
"Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly" is my new Culture spacecraft name.
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 4:30 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 4:30 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
So as to avoid littering the world with broken junk and destroying the habitats of living things.
Littering the oceans is sort of unavoidable if you want to put stuff into orbit. Orbital rockets all dump first-stage boosters that fall back into the ocean. Blowing up a few of them in testing is a fraction of a fraction of the problem.
In the case of the Falcon rockets, they produced a rocket with a reusable first stage that doesn't get dumped in the ocean. It's probably keeping more fuselages out of the ocean than it ever put in.
posted by BungaDunga at 4:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Littering the oceans is sort of unavoidable if you want to put stuff into orbit. Orbital rockets all dump first-stage boosters that fall back into the ocean. Blowing up a few of them in testing is a fraction of a fraction of the problem.
In the case of the Falcon rockets, they produced a rocket with a reusable first stage that doesn't get dumped in the ocean. It's probably keeping more fuselages out of the ocean than it ever put in.
posted by BungaDunga at 4:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Mod note: A few deleted! Please check out our community guidelines for best practices when participating in threads. Insults and swearing at other users is 100% against guidelines.
posted by travelingthyme (staff) at 5:00 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by travelingthyme (staff) at 5:00 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Do we really need to put more stuff in space
posted by silby at 5:17 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by silby at 5:17 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Yes, we absolutely do.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:24 PM on April 20, 2023 [18 favorites]
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:24 PM on April 20, 2023 [18 favorites]
Much of Texas is not suitable terrain for boring
What? It's incredibly boring terrain, but there's always room to improve on that. Texans have been striving at making it even more boring for over 150 years. Usually this seems to involve cattle for some strange reason, though sometimes it involves politicians.
To be fair I'm no rancher and I can't really tell the difference between them because of all the bullshit.
Do we really need to put more stuff in space
Yes, we really need to get Musk off of this planet. And then hopefully fired into the sun, but running out of oxygen on Mars. Experiencing RUD in the upper stratosphere would also be acceptable, but this last option is seen as unacceptably risky as he might actually come back.
By the way, did you know he has blue eyes?
Yeah, one blew this way and one blew that way.
posted by loquacious at 5:45 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
What? It's incredibly boring terrain, but there's always room to improve on that. Texans have been striving at making it even more boring for over 150 years. Usually this seems to involve cattle for some strange reason, though sometimes it involves politicians.
To be fair I'm no rancher and I can't really tell the difference between them because of all the bullshit.
Do we really need to put more stuff in space
Yes, we really need to get Musk off of this planet. And then hopefully fired into the sun, but running out of oxygen on Mars. Experiencing RUD in the upper stratosphere would also be acceptable, but this last option is seen as unacceptably risky as he might actually come back.
By the way, did you know he has blue eyes?
Yeah, one blew this way and one blew that way.
posted by loquacious at 5:45 PM on April 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
I think that the Starship launch is important and significant and I’m rooting for Starship to succeed. Where I diverge from other space nerds is in wanting to temper my hope with some skepticism especially when it comes to the narrative that they are out innovating NASA or that Musk is some tech Jesus.
posted by interogative mood at 6:09 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 6:09 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
the term of art for missions with crew is crewed spaceflight, not “manned,”
Ironically, "manned" in that sense does not refer maleness, but derives from the Latin manos (hand) -- as in manual transmission, so it didn't need to change.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:34 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Ironically, "manned" in that sense does not refer maleness, but derives from the Latin manos (hand) -- as in manual transmission, so it didn't need to change.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 6:34 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
Starting with this Twitter/Threadreaderapp about ElMusk's stupid processes and technologies in the early days of Tesla and continuing with the failures of Tesla technology and of course, most recently, the complete disregard the Muskmelon has for every safeguard Twitter had in place for the health of the site before he got there, I don't trust his technology as far as I can throw him.
He seems to me (I'm a web developer) like a very very bad manager who ignores everything the QA team tells him. Personally I'd be afraid to work for him.
The expectation that today's rocket would blow up and that it was cause for applause seemed to me disrespectful to engineers on the Challenger team, but that's just me.
posted by bendy at 6:40 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
He seems to me (I'm a web developer) like a very very bad manager who ignores everything the QA team tells him. Personally I'd be afraid to work for him.
The expectation that today's rocket would blow up and that it was cause for applause seemed to me disrespectful to engineers on the Challenger team, but that's just me.
posted by bendy at 6:40 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
Ironically, "manned" in that sense does not refer maleness, but derives from the Latin manos (hand) -- as in manual transmission, so it didn't need to change.
Cool but it did
posted by miguelcervantes at 6:44 PM on April 20, 2023 [25 favorites]
Cool but it did
posted by miguelcervantes at 6:44 PM on April 20, 2023 [25 favorites]
“General Quarters, General Quarters, All hands man your battle stations! Army pilots, man your planes!!!”
https://www.pearlharboraviationmuseum.org/blog/aircraft-13-on-the-doolittle-raid/
So the Navy inadvertently solved this problem by calling the collective crew "hands" but still used the sexist verb for getting into one's position.
this, by the way, is my vote for the coolest utterance in the English language, tho I guess "That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind" is close
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 7:29 PM on April 20, 2023
https://www.pearlharboraviationmuseum.org/blog/aircraft-13-on-the-doolittle-raid/
So the Navy inadvertently solved this problem by calling the collective crew "hands" but still used the sexist verb for getting into one's position.
this, by the way, is my vote for the coolest utterance in the English language, tho I guess "That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind" is close
posted by Heywood Mogroot III at 7:29 PM on April 20, 2023
It does not diminish the purity of your political convictions to let your inner five year old feel momentarily joyful about spaceships, especially big rockets what blowed up real good. I would argue that it is in fact healthier than endless frothing grar; that one should instead maintain their grar reserves for things more problematic and less entertainingly explodey, given the brevity of life, etc.
posted by dephlogisticated at 7:30 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by dephlogisticated at 7:30 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
the Latin manos (hand)
Great now I'll have the haunting Torgo theme stuck in my brain for hours
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:57 PM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
Great now I'll have the haunting Torgo theme stuck in my brain for hours
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:57 PM on April 20, 2023 [13 favorites]
Really? You think people who spent years of their lives building an extremely complex 5,000 ton behemoth and are watching the culmination of all their work need some sort of ulterior motive to be excited?
oh sure, getting paid maybe 5% of the profit the company makes from your labor probably involves less motivation for cheering than watching something you worked on actually do the thing you want it to do
perhaps I'm overly cynical about the persistent exploitation by corpo overlords under capitalism and find no real reason to cheer for anything that I'm involved in making regardless of how cool it is. but this cynicism has helped me stay ahead of a lot of 'trends' in the corpo world in predicting how corporations handle things like RTO/bonuses/equity/DEI/etc so eh, I'm not exactly ashamed to say that my assumption is that some people are actually feeling pretty ambivalent but are cheering because it's the proper corpo thing to do in front of senior leadership
posted by paimapi at 8:25 PM on April 20, 2023
oh sure, getting paid maybe 5% of the profit the company makes from your labor probably involves less motivation for cheering than watching something you worked on actually do the thing you want it to do
perhaps I'm overly cynical about the persistent exploitation by corpo overlords under capitalism and find no real reason to cheer for anything that I'm involved in making regardless of how cool it is. but this cynicism has helped me stay ahead of a lot of 'trends' in the corpo world in predicting how corporations handle things like RTO/bonuses/equity/DEI/etc so eh, I'm not exactly ashamed to say that my assumption is that some people are actually feeling pretty ambivalent but are cheering because it's the proper corpo thing to do in front of senior leadership
posted by paimapi at 8:25 PM on April 20, 2023
Now I'll have "Crewos, the Hands of Fate" stuck in my head, double great
posted by phooky at 8:25 PM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by phooky at 8:25 PM on April 20, 2023 [6 favorites]
it's not like NASA doesn't do celebrations these days.
posted by BungaDunga at 8:43 PM on April 20, 2023
posted by BungaDunga at 8:43 PM on April 20, 2023
The Shuttle and the Artemis program were hobbled due to absurd political requirements like having parts built all over the country, vast quantities of pork barrel.
NASA is great in so many ways but in someways spread thin, great science projects, but many and not organized for efficiency.
Boeing and ULA are using engines from Russia and leftovers from the Shuttle. And limiting their programs to those leftovers. Blue Origins has an engine that should be available... this decade or next. (maybe:)
SpaceX has built one thing, an efficient and cost effective launch platform. And that's what we need. There are thousands of important space missions but few ways to get them a couple hundred miles. (Up). The current Falcon rocket is the most reliable, safe, and cheap rocket ever built, saved the ISS and lands, a rocket that *lands*
Somehow not "choose two", they've done all three, "Inconceivable!"
Anyway this was a *test* a very good test -- WE ARE GOING TO MARS (and the moon, asteroids, and beyond!)
posted by sammyo at 8:46 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
NASA is great in so many ways but in someways spread thin, great science projects, but many and not organized for efficiency.
Boeing and ULA are using engines from Russia and leftovers from the Shuttle. And limiting their programs to those leftovers. Blue Origins has an engine that should be available... this decade or next. (maybe:)
SpaceX has built one thing, an efficient and cost effective launch platform. And that's what we need. There are thousands of important space missions but few ways to get them a couple hundred miles. (Up). The current Falcon rocket is the most reliable, safe, and cheap rocket ever built, saved the ISS and lands, a rocket that *lands*
Somehow not "choose two", they've done all three, "Inconceivable!"
Anyway this was a *test* a very good test -- WE ARE GOING TO MARS (and the moon, asteroids, and beyond!)
posted by sammyo at 8:46 PM on April 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
especially big rockets what blowed up real good.
Yeah, I mainly wanted to see the rocket blow up on the pad specifically because it was unmanned and because I knew there was going to be like a thousand HD cameras filming it, and we didn't have these things when the USSR's N1 blew up on the pad and as far as I know it would have been the largest rocket explosion of all time.
I am also very glad that it did not, but mainly because there's a much larger than zero chance it could have hurt or killed someone in the neighboring villages when all of their windows blew out.
Tangenting from that, I'm not at all surprised by the damage to the pad and stand and surrounding areas as seen in flug's link above.
I mean I'm no rocket surgeon but I have been a life long space nerd and I was totally expecting severe pad damage from this launch.
The first time I saw the pics of the lift tower and anemic stand with the flat concrete pad I knew it was going to get totally thrashed by that many Raptor engines hitting it.
For fuck's sake, Starship Heavy is, what, twice the power of the Saturn V? And they want to launch that without a flame trench or heavy water/noise suppression? Even the USSR wasn't that bonkers or frugal.
But I also understand that this stand and tower is just a prototype and proof of concept. They're not going to be launching real missions from it or going to Mars or starting regular Starship/Heavy service from that pad. If anything the whole thing is designed to fail so they can analyze it and learn from it to do it right, but with less totally extreme safety factor of 10+ engineering and cost overruns like NASA has been doing all along.
Which does have its benefits. Pad 39A and B and the VAW and the transport crawler have all outlived not just the Apollo program but also the Space Shuttle and now Falcon 9 and Artemis and more and they definitely did it right the first time, and have been taking care of it and relining it all this time.
I managed to wake up for the live stream this morning and you could clearly see that debris was flying way out from the launch stand before liftoff and making huge splashes and craters and dirt.
And then when it did finally rise off the stand it was obviously not doing well and listing a bit, and as soon as you could see the full length of the flames they were lopsided and you could see colored and irregular flames from burning metal that really shouldn't be there at all.
I've met a couple of Space X enginerds socially we've actually talked about the pad damage issue before this launch because it was one of my first questions, like wtf are you guys doing over there?
It has actually been a known and expected thing with Space X and how they do testing and development. They've wrecked and torn up a lot of concrete pads over the years.
But I don't think they expected this much direct pad damage and secondary damage to surrounding support structures or vehicles. The whole support and launch tower area looks like a bomb hit it.
Also, while my sample size is small apparently every Space X engineer I've met or seen online generally doesn't like Musk and they're kind of used to hearing people complain about him to them by proxy. It's apparently like the first question they're asked by strangers. Not "Oh cool, what do you do?" but "Holy shit is Musk a total asshole? Musk is an asshole! Say it! Tell us he's an asshole!"
I was griping about Musk just like that a little while ago and really letting them have it, and a few words in I clearly saw their eyes just glaze over and this sort of calm, resigned smile on their face and they just started nodding in agreement.
It was weirdly non-cultish or defensive and felt everything like "Oh, yes, give it to him! More! MOAR!"
posted by loquacious at 9:15 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
Yeah, I mainly wanted to see the rocket blow up on the pad specifically because it was unmanned and because I knew there was going to be like a thousand HD cameras filming it, and we didn't have these things when the USSR's N1 blew up on the pad and as far as I know it would have been the largest rocket explosion of all time.
I am also very glad that it did not, but mainly because there's a much larger than zero chance it could have hurt or killed someone in the neighboring villages when all of their windows blew out.
Tangenting from that, I'm not at all surprised by the damage to the pad and stand and surrounding areas as seen in flug's link above.
I mean I'm no rocket surgeon but I have been a life long space nerd and I was totally expecting severe pad damage from this launch.
The first time I saw the pics of the lift tower and anemic stand with the flat concrete pad I knew it was going to get totally thrashed by that many Raptor engines hitting it.
For fuck's sake, Starship Heavy is, what, twice the power of the Saturn V? And they want to launch that without a flame trench or heavy water/noise suppression? Even the USSR wasn't that bonkers or frugal.
But I also understand that this stand and tower is just a prototype and proof of concept. They're not going to be launching real missions from it or going to Mars or starting regular Starship/Heavy service from that pad. If anything the whole thing is designed to fail so they can analyze it and learn from it to do it right, but with less totally extreme safety factor of 10+ engineering and cost overruns like NASA has been doing all along.
Which does have its benefits. Pad 39A and B and the VAW and the transport crawler have all outlived not just the Apollo program but also the Space Shuttle and now Falcon 9 and Artemis and more and they definitely did it right the first time, and have been taking care of it and relining it all this time.
I managed to wake up for the live stream this morning and you could clearly see that debris was flying way out from the launch stand before liftoff and making huge splashes and craters and dirt.
And then when it did finally rise off the stand it was obviously not doing well and listing a bit, and as soon as you could see the full length of the flames they were lopsided and you could see colored and irregular flames from burning metal that really shouldn't be there at all.
I've met a couple of Space X enginerds socially we've actually talked about the pad damage issue before this launch because it was one of my first questions, like wtf are you guys doing over there?
It has actually been a known and expected thing with Space X and how they do testing and development. They've wrecked and torn up a lot of concrete pads over the years.
But I don't think they expected this much direct pad damage and secondary damage to surrounding support structures or vehicles. The whole support and launch tower area looks like a bomb hit it.
Also, while my sample size is small apparently every Space X engineer I've met or seen online generally doesn't like Musk and they're kind of used to hearing people complain about him to them by proxy. It's apparently like the first question they're asked by strangers. Not "Oh cool, what do you do?" but "Holy shit is Musk a total asshole? Musk is an asshole! Say it! Tell us he's an asshole!"
I was griping about Musk just like that a little while ago and really letting them have it, and a few words in I clearly saw their eyes just glaze over and this sort of calm, resigned smile on their face and they just started nodding in agreement.
It was weirdly non-cultish or defensive and felt everything like "Oh, yes, give it to him! More! MOAR!"
posted by loquacious at 9:15 PM on April 20, 2023 [8 favorites]
So are we suggesting that rockets like this be called "hands free"? "Hands off?" "Unhanded?"
posted by straight at 9:22 PM on April 20, 2023
posted by straight at 9:22 PM on April 20, 2023
"Houston we have a metaphor for Twitter," said Stephen Colbert
posted by bendy at 10:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by bendy at 10:59 PM on April 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
In other tortured euphemism news, Russia today announced an "accidental discharge of aviation ammunition" to describe blowing a bloody great crater in one of its own cities by mistakenly firing a missile at it.
posted by Paul Slade at 12:21 AM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Paul Slade at 12:21 AM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Ironically, "manned" in that sense does not refer maleness, but derives from the Latin manos (hand) -- as in manual transmission, so it didn't need to change.
I just searched a bunch of online dictionaries and I can find no evidence that this is true. Manned appears to related to man, just as you'd expect. (Also, Latin for 'hand' is manus (fourth declension).)
posted by The Tensor at 12:35 AM on April 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
I just searched a bunch of online dictionaries and I can find no evidence that this is true. Manned appears to related to man, just as you'd expect. (Also, Latin for 'hand' is manus (fourth declension).)
posted by The Tensor at 12:35 AM on April 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Very exciting! Solving full reusability at this scale opens the door for so much more space science and industry.
I'm surprised the booster performed as well as it did given the launch damage and wild supersonic flight profile.
The remaining big unknowns are 2nd stage reentry and the tower catches but it's hard to imagine Spacex failing to iterate the path to success from here.
posted by neonamber at 4:00 AM on April 21, 2023
I'm surprised the booster performed as well as it did given the launch damage and wild supersonic flight profile.
The remaining big unknowns are 2nd stage reentry and the tower catches but it's hard to imagine Spacex failing to iterate the path to success from here.
posted by neonamber at 4:00 AM on April 21, 2023
I gotta say it's fascinating to see how hatred distorts otherwise reasonable people's perceptions.
I hope the hatred you're talking about is Musk's hatred of "NPCs," the poors, etc., and not our hatred of Musk. It's entirely appropriate to be intolerant of his platforming and participation in hate speech. If his hatred distorts our perception of his rocket company, there's only one place to lay the blame.
posted by rikschell at 4:50 AM on April 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
I hope the hatred you're talking about is Musk's hatred of "NPCs," the poors, etc., and not our hatred of Musk. It's entirely appropriate to be intolerant of his platforming and participation in hate speech. If his hatred distorts our perception of his rocket company, there's only one place to lay the blame.
posted by rikschell at 4:50 AM on April 21, 2023 [10 favorites]
Because it was so sneakily quoted way, way up-thread, I went back and watched this magnificent comedy classic, and frankly it is perfect for the idiocy of this whole incident.
posted by prismatic7 at 4:54 AM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by prismatic7 at 4:54 AM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I mean, cardboard's out.
posted by prismatic7 at 4:54 AM on April 21, 2023
posted by prismatic7 at 4:54 AM on April 21, 2023
In this instance, wasn't the issue that the front didn't fall off?
posted by flabdablet at 6:25 AM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by flabdablet at 6:25 AM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
Imperial propaganda officer: "Looks like we've got what we call a 'rapid unscheduled disassembly' of the Death Star."
[cut to Palpatine sitting at a console, looking casual]
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:33 AM on April 21, 2023
[cut to Palpatine sitting at a console, looking casual]
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:33 AM on April 21, 2023
Ironically, "manned" in that sense does not refer maleness, but derives from the Latin manos (hand) -- as in manual transmission, so it didn't need to change.
Cool but it did
Personally, I'm fascinated by the idea that rockets have a transmission of power to their space wheels.
posted by srboisvert at 6:53 AM on April 21, 2023
Cool but it did
Personally, I'm fascinated by the idea that rockets have a transmission of power to their space wheels.
posted by srboisvert at 6:53 AM on April 21, 2023
I'm still giggling at "Phony Stark". So perfect.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 7:07 AM on April 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 7:07 AM on April 21, 2023 [8 favorites]
It's very culty behavior.
posted by zardoz
A touch eponhysterical.
posted by doctornemo at 7:37 AM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by zardoz
A touch eponhysterical.
posted by doctornemo at 7:37 AM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
How about in two or three years, when SpaceX is launching and landing a dozen or more Super Heavy rockets while NASA's method allows it a single launch a year?
Is this like how self-driving cars are two or three years away?
posted by AlSweigart at 9:17 AM on April 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
Is this like how self-driving cars are two or three years away?
posted by AlSweigart at 9:17 AM on April 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
Just another 'airborne toxic event' by Elon
posted by Ahmad Khani at 9:35 AM on April 21, 2023
posted by Ahmad Khani at 9:35 AM on April 21, 2023
I wish I could root for SpaceX, but I'm legitimately concerned people are going to blow up.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:50 AM on April 20 [1 favorite +] [!]
So are the local residents and Native people. But don't worry! they have been arrested. problem solved?
Also, I know that when LNG facilities blow up, there is not much news coverage, but the Brownsville / Padre Island area is also subject to 3 massive LNG Export terminals to be built for selling methane to Asia / International Market: Annova LNG, Texas LNG, and Rio Grande LNG. love the names. Under the 2012 US FPA, LNG facilities should undergo a Quantitative Risk Assessment before receiving Federal FERC or Army Corps permits to excavate the local wetlands and export US gas to foreign nations.
Are these risk assessments happening? And i don't mean on the internet. Are the risks being evaluated by independent hazard experts?
I really wish that the USA / Space X / Oil companies / Texas would not put its "giant rockets we shoot off and we expect to detonate" next to its "gargantuan methane storage and trading facilities with a high explosion risk" in the exact same town, in the exact same Wildlife Refuge, just a couple miles apart.
I'm sure drones are banned in Boca Chica, because of the noise impact to wildlife. But Space X? ground shaking launches? fine.
Cynically, is this how oil and gas is dealing with its stranded assets problem? Act of Musk?
But Brownsville is poor, and speaks Spanish as its primary language, so...
It's boringly sociologically predictable why these hazards overlap, when, from an engineering perspective, a risk perspective, it seems like you would want to keep these hazards far apart from each other.
posted by eustatic at 10:02 AM on April 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:50 AM on April 20 [1 favorite +] [!]
So are the local residents and Native people. But don't worry! they have been arrested. problem solved?
Also, I know that when LNG facilities blow up, there is not much news coverage, but the Brownsville / Padre Island area is also subject to 3 massive LNG Export terminals to be built for selling methane to Asia / International Market: Annova LNG, Texas LNG, and Rio Grande LNG. love the names. Under the 2012 US FPA, LNG facilities should undergo a Quantitative Risk Assessment before receiving Federal FERC or Army Corps permits to excavate the local wetlands and export US gas to foreign nations.
Are these risk assessments happening? And i don't mean on the internet. Are the risks being evaluated by independent hazard experts?
I really wish that the USA / Space X / Oil companies / Texas would not put its "giant rockets we shoot off and we expect to detonate" next to its "gargantuan methane storage and trading facilities with a high explosion risk" in the exact same town, in the exact same Wildlife Refuge, just a couple miles apart.
I'm sure drones are banned in Boca Chica, because of the noise impact to wildlife. But Space X? ground shaking launches? fine.
Cynically, is this how oil and gas is dealing with its stranded assets problem? Act of Musk?
But Brownsville is poor, and speaks Spanish as its primary language, so...
It's boringly sociologically predictable why these hazards overlap, when, from an engineering perspective, a risk perspective, it seems like you would want to keep these hazards far apart from each other.
posted by eustatic at 10:02 AM on April 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Is this like how self-driving cars are two or three years away?
Building rockets is much easier than building a self-driving car.
(if you want to make fun of a billionaire rocket that's permanently coming Real Soon Now, there's Bezos' New Glenn)
posted by BungaDunga at 10:05 AM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
Building rockets is much easier than building a self-driving car.
(if you want to make fun of a billionaire rocket that's permanently coming Real Soon Now, there's Bezos' New Glenn)
posted by BungaDunga at 10:05 AM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
from the Bird impact by Space X article above, there have been population losses during the Space X operations at Boca Chica:
Meanwhile, a 2021 analysis(opens in new tab) of the piping plover population (following individuals marked with tags) suggests the winter population fell 54 percent between 2018 and 2021, from 308 individuals to 142 individuals. That decline is what worries the American Bird Conservancy, which attributes the problem(opens in new tab) to SpaceX and human disturbance. There are subtleties to the figure, however.
It stinks that this doesn't require an Environmental Impact Statement, just a preliminary assessment, especially given the massive recent industrialization of the area. There should be a cumulative impacts assessment.
posted by eustatic at 10:21 AM on April 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
Meanwhile, a 2021 analysis(opens in new tab) of the piping plover population (following individuals marked with tags) suggests the winter population fell 54 percent between 2018 and 2021, from 308 individuals to 142 individuals. That decline is what worries the American Bird Conservancy, which attributes the problem(opens in new tab) to SpaceX and human disturbance. There are subtleties to the figure, however.
It stinks that this doesn't require an Environmental Impact Statement, just a preliminary assessment, especially given the massive recent industrialization of the area. There should be a cumulative impacts assessment.
posted by eustatic at 10:21 AM on April 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
I’m not sure if the Russian ministry of defense is copying SpaceX or trolling. Yesterday they accidentally bombed one of their own cities and described the incident as “accidental discharge of aviation ammunition”.
Seems similar to calling a rocket blowing up a rapid unscheduled disassembly.
posted by interogative mood at 10:39 AM on April 21, 2023
Seems similar to calling a rocket blowing up a rapid unscheduled disassembly.
posted by interogative mood at 10:39 AM on April 21, 2023
"accidental discharge of aviation ammunition": attempt to obfuscate using technical language
"rapid unscheduled disassembly": tongue-in-cheek mocking of attempts to obfuscate using technical language
posted by The Tensor at 10:44 AM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
"rapid unscheduled disassembly": tongue-in-cheek mocking of attempts to obfuscate using technical language
posted by The Tensor at 10:44 AM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
MetaFilter: given the brevity of life, etc.
posted by vibrotronica at 10:54 AM on April 21, 2023
posted by vibrotronica at 10:54 AM on April 21, 2023
NASA's method allows it a single launch a year?
I think they're targeting every two years. Ish. Falcon 9's been averaging a bit under twice a week so far this year.
Are these risk assessments happening?
@ESGHound is a decent Twitter follow for discussion of that topic. Appears to know a fair bit about how the government is supposed to function, doesn't think it's actually functioning, wants a DOT 4f review.
I am wondering how SpaceX could count yesterday's launch as a success if the lesson they learn turns out to be "we need a flame trench with a deluge, and we can't build one in a wildlife reserve". I think the answer is it'd only be a success if it allows them to maintain some kind of launch cadence. Even though it didn't blow up on the launch stand, it does kinda look like the damage sustained on the ground wasn't much less than if it had. As hardware rich as they seem, it's difficult to see how they launch from Texas again this year.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 11:09 AM on April 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
I think they're targeting every two years. Ish. Falcon 9's been averaging a bit under twice a week so far this year.
Are these risk assessments happening?
@ESGHound is a decent Twitter follow for discussion of that topic. Appears to know a fair bit about how the government is supposed to function, doesn't think it's actually functioning, wants a DOT 4f review.
I am wondering how SpaceX could count yesterday's launch as a success if the lesson they learn turns out to be "we need a flame trench with a deluge, and we can't build one in a wildlife reserve". I think the answer is it'd only be a success if it allows them to maintain some kind of launch cadence. Even though it didn't blow up on the launch stand, it does kinda look like the damage sustained on the ground wasn't much less than if it had. As hardware rich as they seem, it's difficult to see how they launch from Texas again this year.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 11:09 AM on April 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Scott Manley : SpaceX's Massive Rocket Explodes Due to Rapid Unscheduled Digging.
posted by Pendragon at 12:31 PM on April 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Pendragon at 12:31 PM on April 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
The Onion: Could you pass the SpaceX aptitude test?
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 12:36 PM on April 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 12:36 PM on April 21, 2023 [6 favorites]
The number of launches is a meaningless number and provides no basis of comparison between NASA and SpaceX. How many crewed Falcon missions would SpaceX launch each year if NASA wasn’t paying them to send astronauts and equipment to ISS? NASA launches rockets, including some provided by SpaceX when they need to; not just for the sake of launching a rocket.
posted by interogative mood at 1:55 PM on April 21, 2023
posted by interogative mood at 1:55 PM on April 21, 2023
Before Musk went totally batshit and started cratering Twitter, back when he still looked like an at least semi-competent person, mefi's own Charlie Stross had some speculation about Starship. Because there's no business case for it. No one today needs that much stuff launched all in one go.
Stross wondered if Musk might have been planning to launch a LOT of orbital solar collectors and corner the energy market in an effort to become the world's first trillionaire.
Now that Musk has been self destructing in realtime and in pubic over on Twitter, he's lost all that Phony Stark image he once had, but the concept isn't really all that complicated and we know Musk grew up on the same Heinlein and Asimov SF that a lot of us did so the idea of orbital power and energy as the big moneymaker have been put into Musk's skull. He might not have thought of it on his own, but he didn't need to think of it on his own. Heinlein, Asimov, and Haldeman did the big idea part, all that's left is the engineering and execution part.
And Musk, for all that he's proven himself to be a childish asshole and not very bright, is still a multi-billionaire. If he WAS thinking of getting into orbital solar power as his next big money making venture, he may be even more desperate to make it work now so that like the famous mad scientist line says, he can show them, he'll show them all! MWAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!
Furthermore, while Musk is a twerp, Space-X is filled with genuinely brilliant people and competent engineers. If they keep putting in the effort on Starship I'm sure they'll make it work sooner or later, and probably sooner. They have more experience with new rocket designs than any other people on Earth after all.
There's still no actual business case for Starship. There's no actual economic reason for Space-X to be building it. So clearly they think they have a reason to be setting up to put a LOT of something into orbit. The only question is what they're planning to put up there, and orbital solar panels is a definite possibility.
Or you could go all Dr. Evil and suspect he might be planning to deploy a really big mirror and threaten to blot out the sun over Manhattan or put up orbital rail guns and declare himself emperor of Earth under threat of orbital bombardment. Given how off the rails Musk has gone, neither of those would surprise me at this point.
posted by sotonohito at 2:48 PM on April 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
Stross wondered if Musk might have been planning to launch a LOT of orbital solar collectors and corner the energy market in an effort to become the world's first trillionaire.
Now that Musk has been self destructing in realtime and in pubic over on Twitter, he's lost all that Phony Stark image he once had, but the concept isn't really all that complicated and we know Musk grew up on the same Heinlein and Asimov SF that a lot of us did so the idea of orbital power and energy as the big moneymaker have been put into Musk's skull. He might not have thought of it on his own, but he didn't need to think of it on his own. Heinlein, Asimov, and Haldeman did the big idea part, all that's left is the engineering and execution part.
And Musk, for all that he's proven himself to be a childish asshole and not very bright, is still a multi-billionaire. If he WAS thinking of getting into orbital solar power as his next big money making venture, he may be even more desperate to make it work now so that like the famous mad scientist line says, he can show them, he'll show them all! MWAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!
Furthermore, while Musk is a twerp, Space-X is filled with genuinely brilliant people and competent engineers. If they keep putting in the effort on Starship I'm sure they'll make it work sooner or later, and probably sooner. They have more experience with new rocket designs than any other people on Earth after all.
There's still no actual business case for Starship. There's no actual economic reason for Space-X to be building it. So clearly they think they have a reason to be setting up to put a LOT of something into orbit. The only question is what they're planning to put up there, and orbital solar panels is a definite possibility.
Or you could go all Dr. Evil and suspect he might be planning to deploy a really big mirror and threaten to blot out the sun over Manhattan or put up orbital rail guns and declare himself emperor of Earth under threat of orbital bombardment. Given how off the rails Musk has gone, neither of those would surprise me at this point.
posted by sotonohito at 2:48 PM on April 21, 2023 [4 favorites]
After reading the Environmental Assessment for this launchpad, this permit has clearly been exceeded, to the extent that fraud has been committed, and there should be numerous lawsuits, against the government and against SpaceX.
I mean, how much debris would have fallen on Port Isabel if it had blown up on the pad?
The fact that that is all we are hearing about 'hey we expected it to blow up on the pad' means that they foresaw damages worse than this, and worse than want they admitted to in the permit, but withheld that information from the government.
The FAA and USACE should not be allowed to issue emergency after the fact permits. You cannot reward bad behavior like this
posted by eustatic at 5:16 PM on April 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
I mean, how much debris would have fallen on Port Isabel if it had blown up on the pad?
The fact that that is all we are hearing about 'hey we expected it to blow up on the pad' means that they foresaw damages worse than this, and worse than want they admitted to in the permit, but withheld that information from the government.
The FAA and USACE should not be allowed to issue emergency after the fact permits. You cannot reward bad behavior like this
posted by eustatic at 5:16 PM on April 21, 2023 [7 favorites]
I thought this was a nice piece on how Starship could be such a shitshow when SpaceX was competent at developing the Falcons.
posted by tavella at 6:50 PM on April 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by tavella at 6:50 PM on April 21, 2023 [3 favorites]
Lots Gwynne Shotwell support here. Especially for someone who has helped musk cover up sexual abuse and fired whistle blowers.
posted by Iax at 7:47 PM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Iax at 7:47 PM on April 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
After reading the Environmental Assessment for this launchpad, this permit has clearly been exceeded, to the extent that fraud has been committed, and there should be numerous lawsuits, against the government and against SpaceX.
To what extent does this just not happen because it’s Texas?
posted by Artw at 8:36 PM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
To what extent does this just not happen because it’s Texas?
posted by Artw at 8:36 PM on April 21, 2023 [1 favorite]
SpaceX didn’t want to blow up its launchpad. It may have done just that. Lots of details on what we know about the failure of the launchpad and the mess the flying concrete made in the area.
There's always a tweet. A lot of chatterati are talking about this Musk comment from 2020:
posted by Nelson at 6:33 AM on April 22, 2023 [5 favorites]
There's always a tweet. A lot of chatterati are talking about this Musk comment from 2020:
Aspiring to have no flame diverter in Boca, but this could turn out to be a mistakeIndeed, it is looking possible that was a mistake. And yes, there's another tweet:
3 months ago, we started building a massive water-cooled, steel plate to go under the launch mount.But hey, they got to light up on 4/20.
Wasn’t ready in time & we wrongly thought, based on static fire data, that Fondag would make it through 1 launch.
Looks like we can be ready to launch again in 1 to 2 months.
posted by Nelson at 6:33 AM on April 22, 2023 [5 favorites]
>>Yes, we absolutely do.
>>posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:24 PM on April 20 [17 favorites +] [!]
>Want to fill us in on why?
Dunno what's on Brandon's mind but for me, survival is not enough. Humans need to dream, we need to push frontiers, we need (to steal a phrase) to go where no one has gone before. If we're just going to sit in the cradle and stew in our own juices we might as well wrap things up now.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:15 AM on April 22, 2023
>>posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:24 PM on April 20 [17 favorites +] [!]
>Want to fill us in on why?
Dunno what's on Brandon's mind but for me, survival is not enough. Humans need to dream, we need to push frontiers, we need (to steal a phrase) to go where no one has gone before. If we're just going to sit in the cradle and stew in our own juices we might as well wrap things up now.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:15 AM on April 22, 2023
Heinlein, Asimov, and Haldeman did the big idea part, all that's left is the engineering and execution part.
Or we could just not.
posted by flabdablet at 8:40 AM on April 22, 2023
Or we could just not.
posted by flabdablet at 8:40 AM on April 22, 2023
Humans need to dream, we need to push frontiers, we need (to steal a phrase) to go where no one has gone before.
Space becoming the toy of fashy millionaires kills that dream stone dead for me. Now It’s just another prison but up. Another thing they can go fuck themselves for.
posted by Artw at 8:43 AM on April 22, 2023 [13 favorites]
Space becoming the toy of fashy millionaires kills that dream stone dead for me. Now It’s just another prison but up. Another thing they can go fuck themselves for.
posted by Artw at 8:43 AM on April 22, 2023 [13 favorites]
This cradle would be mighty cushy if we just stopped shitting in it, maybe did some laundry, fixed it up a little.
But no, it's apparently disposable.
posted by tigrrrlily at 11:15 AM on April 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
But no, it's apparently disposable.
posted by tigrrrlily at 11:15 AM on April 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Is rehashing the decades-old “should we or should we not go to space” debate actually going to bring anyone any satisfaction in this thread?
And when I say “decades-old” I mean that literally, on this website, we’ve had this debate repeatedly in space-related posts.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 12:40 PM on April 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
And when I say “decades-old” I mean that literally, on this website, we’ve had this debate repeatedly in space-related posts.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 12:40 PM on April 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
One of the things I keep wondering about in terms of the Starship design is wy the big mega booster? Falcon Heavy uses a main booster and two side boosters. Wouldn't scaling that up to lift more be a better idea?
Also, landing the first stange back at the launch pad seems needlessly complex. But fantastic if they can reliably pull it off in between instances where the landing does damage the launch pad, so we'll see how it goes.
Finally, the lack of an abort system is an interesting detail in a post Space Shuttle world.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:03 PM on April 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Also, landing the first stange back at the launch pad seems needlessly complex. But fantastic if they can reliably pull it off in between instances where the landing does damage the launch pad, so we'll see how it goes.
Finally, the lack of an abort system is an interesting detail in a post Space Shuttle world.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:03 PM on April 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Space becoming the toy of fashy millionaires kills that dream stone dead for me. Now It’s just another prison but up. Another thing they can go fuck themselves for.
Expanse is such a good tv series!
posted by srboisvert at 2:57 PM on April 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Expanse is such a good tv series!
posted by srboisvert at 2:57 PM on April 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
To paraphrase Milhouse, first it started blowing up, then it blew up.
Or you could straight-up quote Ernest Hemingway:
Or you could straight-up quote Ernest Hemingway:
“How did you go bankrupt?"posted by kirkaracha at 4:27 PM on April 22, 2023
Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.”
If I understand correctly the pad design they went with was the result of a desire to avoid various environmental review related delays that would have become involved had they chosen to do it the right way.
posted by interogative mood at 11:13 PM on April 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by interogative mood at 11:13 PM on April 22, 2023 [3 favorites]
Is rehashing the decades-old “should we or should we not go to space” debate actually going to bring anyone any satisfaction in this thread?
"We" aren't going when people like Musk do it. And no one was arguing against space travel, that I saw...
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:42 AM on April 23, 2023
"We" aren't going when people like Musk do it. And no one was arguing against space travel, that I saw...
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:42 AM on April 23, 2023
Launch video at half-speed, where the side lean and debris is more noticeable (Facebook link)
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:04 PM on April 23, 2023
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:04 PM on April 23, 2023
Launch video at half-speed, where the side lean and debris is more noticeable (Facebook link)
Mildly impressed that it survived as long as it did given all the shit from the ground it got shotgunned by.
It’s interesting, based on that video I’d say Space X was a dangerously incompetent company that should not be getting any more NASA money, the comments are all like “woo hoo! Awesome crater! Using a fuckton of thrust to fatally compromise a vehicle on launch is GENIUS! Imagine how big the crater will be on mars!”
You guys all know Elon is never putting a sling leg fucking thing on Mars right? That is a delusion we are all free of here?
posted by Artw at 1:01 PM on April 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
Mildly impressed that it survived as long as it did given all the shit from the ground it got shotgunned by.
It’s interesting, based on that video I’d say Space X was a dangerously incompetent company that should not be getting any more NASA money, the comments are all like “woo hoo! Awesome crater! Using a fuckton of thrust to fatally compromise a vehicle on launch is GENIUS! Imagine how big the crater will be on mars!”
You guys all know Elon is never putting a sling leg fucking thing on Mars right? That is a delusion we are all free of here?
posted by Artw at 1:01 PM on April 23, 2023 [9 favorites]
That can't be right. I'm sure I heard him say he'd have a tunnel to there by 2027. Or was it that a hyperloop service? It's so hard to keep track.
posted by flabdablet at 1:55 PM on April 23, 2023
posted by flabdablet at 1:55 PM on April 23, 2023
A few more pictures and video from the launch area, courtesy of Jack Beyer, content manager for NASA Spaceflight website.
The area looks incredibly damaged obviously, which raises all sorts of questions about how SpaceX plans to deal with launching from the Moon or Mars, where dirt and debris will be the norm.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:11 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
The area looks incredibly damaged obviously, which raises all sorts of questions about how SpaceX plans to deal with launching from the Moon or Mars, where dirt and debris will be the norm.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:11 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Launch from Earth is 33 raptor engines at full power; back of the envelope math says you could launch a fully-fueled starship from lunar surface with the 6 engines at about 15% power, though you'd presumably want to throttle up afterwards.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:28 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:28 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
Is that 15% gonna kick up dangerous amounts of debris? I honestly don’t know, hence the question. Am guessing that it could be problematic if they’re landing at any random spot with unknown loose stones, but I never had those problems on Kerbal Space Program, so who knows?!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:01 PM on April 23, 2023
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:01 PM on April 23, 2023
I mean, obviously, if a launch can trigger a planet explosion right behind it so many propulsion problems will be solved all at once.
posted by delfin at 5:38 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by delfin at 5:38 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
IIRC the earliest design shown for lunar starship had a set of lower powered hypergolic engines near the top for landing and launching from the Moon. I wonder if they'll reappear given this shitshow. One fun thing about operating large rockets close to the Moon's surface is that the debris kicked up can exceed orbital velocity.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 5:44 PM on April 23, 2023
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 5:44 PM on April 23, 2023
according to wikipedia, a set of 24 methane/oxygen RCS thrusters mounted partway up
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:45 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:45 PM on April 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
In the case of the Falcon rockets, they produced a rocket with a reusable first stage that doesn't get dumped in the ocean. It's probably keeping more fuselages out of the ocean than it ever put in.
Not always-- they can still be expendable depending upon the mission parameters (mass, altitude, etc.)
posted by drstrangelove at 4:37 AM on April 24, 2023
Not always-- they can still be expendable depending upon the mission parameters (mass, altitude, etc.)
posted by drstrangelove at 4:37 AM on April 24, 2023
The contortions some people are doing to try to say "but it was a GOOD thing they blew up the launch pad" are making me laugh. I wasn't going to diss the failure initially, rockets do blow up when testing new things. But when I found out they hadn't bothered with any of the basic, well-known damage reduction techniques, oh my god. "But they will learn so much from it being destroyed!" - the fact that your rocket will not work well when you put big chunks of debris through it is not something you need to learn more about. "but they thought it wouldn't be badly damaged" - then they should be firing people, because this is boring old materials science and easily modeled, not some new mechanism you need to test. Not to mention they were building a flame diverter so obviously they knew perfectly well what was going to happen, Elon just didn't want to wait 2 months he wanted his 420 joke. "But by not waiting they got the rocket data now instead of in two months!" Well, first of all they don't actually have very good rocket data because they don't know what would have worked if they hadn't decided to spray rocks through their rocket, so at best their data is more limited than it could have been and at worst it's not accurate. And second, they "saved" two months at the cost of having to rebuild the launch pad and facing possible delays from FAA and EPA reviews, not to mention lawsuits.
posted by tavella at 11:27 AM on April 24, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by tavella at 11:27 AM on April 24, 2023 [10 favorites]
Oh, and I forgot "it's a good test for when they take off from the Moon or Mars" -- no, it's a terrible test! Neither the Moon or Mars would require this amount of thrust, nor will they have concrete pads to take off from. It tells you nothing about that!
posted by tavella at 12:20 PM on April 24, 2023
posted by tavella at 12:20 PM on April 24, 2023
the term of art for missions with crew is crewed spaceflight, not “manned,” and has been for many, many years.
We're overdue for an unmanned crewed mission to the moon.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 3:10 PM on April 24, 2023 [4 favorites]
We're overdue for an unmanned crewed mission to the moon.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 3:10 PM on April 24, 2023 [4 favorites]
Going to quote myself here:
Progress for SpaceX.. at the expense of who else? Of what else?
Environmental engineers and advocates are concerned the ash- and sand-like particulate matter could hurt people’s respiratory health, and could irreparably harm endangered species in the area.
posted by curious nu at 4:52 PM on April 24, 2023 [6 favorites]
Progress for SpaceX.. at the expense of who else? Of what else?
Environmental engineers and advocates are concerned the ash- and sand-like particulate matter could hurt people’s respiratory health, and could irreparably harm endangered species in the area.
posted by curious nu at 4:52 PM on April 24, 2023 [6 favorites]
Was wondering why Starship didn't separate from the SuperHeavy booster. According to comments on Ars Technica, the stack wasn't high enough yet plus the first stage engines hadn't cut off, which is a major necessity for igniting the second stage. Bummer, would have have liked to have seen if Starhip itself worked better than the first stage Super Heavy booster.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:13 AM on April 25, 2023
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:13 AM on April 25, 2023
Environmental engineers and advocates are concerned the ash- and sand-like particulate matter could hurt people’s respiratory health
Is it just me, or was anybody else also irritated by how that article repeatedly implied that the dust cloud in question was a consequence of the explosion rather than the launch? It read as if written by somebody who hadn't bothered watching the launch first.
posted by flabdablet at 5:33 AM on April 25, 2023 [1 favorite]
Is it just me, or was anybody else also irritated by how that article repeatedly implied that the dust cloud in question was a consequence of the explosion rather than the launch? It read as if written by somebody who hadn't bothered watching the launch first.
posted by flabdablet at 5:33 AM on April 25, 2023 [1 favorite]
In related "going to space today" news:
The Hakuto-R M1 lander touched down on the lunar surface at 12:40, although it is not yet confirmed whether it was a soft or hard landing.posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 10:42 AM on April 25, 2023
Commercial lunar lander presumed lost after historic moon landing attempt
posted by Artw at 10:48 AM on April 25, 2023
posted by Artw at 10:48 AM on April 25, 2023
Well, shit. This was a bad *week* to go into space, looks like.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 11:27 AM on April 25, 2023
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 11:27 AM on April 25, 2023
ALL THIS WEEKS ARE YOURS.
EXCEPT THIS ONE, DON’T EVEN TRY IT.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:39 AM on April 25, 2023 [2 favorites]
EXCEPT THIS ONE, DON’T EVEN TRY IT.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:39 AM on April 25, 2023 [2 favorites]
SpaceX Starship launch under FAA investigation after raining potentially hazardous debris on homes and beaches
The FAA's mishap investigation is standard practice when rockets go astray. The FAA’s investigation will need to conclude that Starship does not affect public safety before it can launch again. As debris spread far further than anticipated, the FAA's "anomaly response plan" has also come into force, meaning SpaceX must complete extra "environmental mitigations" before reapplying for its launch license.posted by hydropsyche at 5:57 PM on April 26, 2023 [3 favorites]
ESGHound: SpaceX's Texas Rocket Caused a Big Mess - What's Next?. Following up on their pre-launch essay SpaceX's Texas Rocket is Going To Cause A Lot More Damage Than Anyone Thinks. Lots of details on what went wrong, particularly from a "what will the FAA thing?" perspective.
posted by Nelson at 7:01 PM on April 26, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Nelson at 7:01 PM on April 26, 2023 [3 favorites]
With any luck, a Musk prediction might actually be right and we won't have to put up with this nonsense for much longer.
posted by flabdablet at 12:35 AM on April 27, 2023
posted by flabdablet at 12:35 AM on April 27, 2023
Just read a very informative summary by Lupi on cohost on why they consider the Starship project to be ill-conceived.
posted by of strange foe at 7:59 AM on April 27, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by of strange foe at 7:59 AM on April 27, 2023 [6 favorites]
Thanks for that Lupi link, it really puts in context the difference between this rocket and the very successful Falcon 9.
posted by rikschell at 9:49 AM on April 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by rikschell at 9:49 AM on April 28, 2023 [1 favorite]
Thanks for some of the substantial links Nelson and of strange foe, very illuminating.
posted by Wretch729 at 8:55 AM on April 29, 2023
posted by Wretch729 at 8:55 AM on April 29, 2023
According to this NYT story, Musk is now admitting that the flight termination system didn't work.
They hit the button and the FTS blew holes in the tanks, but the rocket kept going for another 40 seconds before blowing up of its own accord.
Between that and the Lupi/ESGHound pieces posted above, this whole thing is looking like a colossal shitshow.
posted by automatronic at 3:28 AM on April 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
They hit the button and the FTS blew holes in the tanks, but the rocket kept going for another 40 seconds before blowing up of its own accord.
Between that and the Lupi/ESGHound pieces posted above, this whole thing is looking like a colossal shitshow.
posted by automatronic at 3:28 AM on April 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
Although the rocket did not make it to space, “the outcome was roughly what I expected, and maybe slightly exceeding my expectations,” Mr. Musk said, noting that it got “clear of the pad with minimal damage to the pad.”
This being the pad that exploded and that pieces of which were flying through the air. Dude lies like he breathes.
posted by Artw at 8:58 AM on April 30, 2023 [5 favorites]
This being the pad that exploded and that pieces of which were flying through the air. Dude lies like he breathes.
posted by Artw at 8:58 AM on April 30, 2023 [5 favorites]
Yeah, I just want to point out that the people who were giving tclark shit about his claim that the rocket should have self-destructed much earlier were wrong and very confidently so. He was mistaken that it was controlled manually by a range safety officer, and his critics were correct that it used an automated system, but the bottom line is that it should have detonated 40 seconds earlier and that failure was not good.
“You guys all know Elon is never putting a sling leg fucking thing on Mars right? That is a delusion we are all free of here?”
All of the crewed Mars mission plans are fantastical — there are huge issues with shielding the crew from cosmic radiation both in the very long transit and on the surface of Mars that haven't yet been (realistically) solved. And those are far from the only obstacles to sending people to Mars and back.
I've said this before, but my bona fides as a space exploration enthusiast are solid — I was a member of the Planetary Society for maybe ten or more years in the 80s and 90s, when they were agitating for a crewed Mars mission. But a long time ago I was converted to the inexpensive "science first" program that's been hugely successful for the last thirty years and crewed missions have looked more and more like a boondoggle. I'm not opposed in principle to crewed spaceflight, but Musk's et al "the future of humanity is at stake" is just fucking science fiction fanboy nonsense and is like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. I do believe that eventually we'll see inner system habitation a la The Expanse, but wow are there a huge host of problems that are in the way of that. Making people think that a crewed mission to Mars is some big step toward that future is delusional — in that relative context, it's hardly more than what we already accomplished with the Apollo program. Yes, on the one hand I'm saying that going to Mars is much, much more difficult than going to the Moon, and on the other hand I'm saying that it's not much different. That's not inconsistent: it's because it's like going from algebra to calculus is a big deal to schoolchildren, but both are trivial compared to getting a mathematics degree.
I'm ambivalent about private enterprise space travel. I do sort of accept that commercialization of space is an unfortunate prerequisite for the kind of future where the potential benefits are realized. But I also recognize that capitalists are untrustworthy and exploitative and they're going to put profits ahead of people. Or, worse, just their own narcissism ahead of, well, everything like Musk does. So I'm no fan. I like that space exploration is accelerating, but I'm very cynical about everything that's not genuine science.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 9:25 AM on April 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
“You guys all know Elon is never putting a sling leg fucking thing on Mars right? That is a delusion we are all free of here?”
All of the crewed Mars mission plans are fantastical — there are huge issues with shielding the crew from cosmic radiation both in the very long transit and on the surface of Mars that haven't yet been (realistically) solved. And those are far from the only obstacles to sending people to Mars and back.
I've said this before, but my bona fides as a space exploration enthusiast are solid — I was a member of the Planetary Society for maybe ten or more years in the 80s and 90s, when they were agitating for a crewed Mars mission. But a long time ago I was converted to the inexpensive "science first" program that's been hugely successful for the last thirty years and crewed missions have looked more and more like a boondoggle. I'm not opposed in principle to crewed spaceflight, but Musk's et al "the future of humanity is at stake" is just fucking science fiction fanboy nonsense and is like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. I do believe that eventually we'll see inner system habitation a la The Expanse, but wow are there a huge host of problems that are in the way of that. Making people think that a crewed mission to Mars is some big step toward that future is delusional — in that relative context, it's hardly more than what we already accomplished with the Apollo program. Yes, on the one hand I'm saying that going to Mars is much, much more difficult than going to the Moon, and on the other hand I'm saying that it's not much different. That's not inconsistent: it's because it's like going from algebra to calculus is a big deal to schoolchildren, but both are trivial compared to getting a mathematics degree.
I'm ambivalent about private enterprise space travel. I do sort of accept that commercialization of space is an unfortunate prerequisite for the kind of future where the potential benefits are realized. But I also recognize that capitalists are untrustworthy and exploitative and they're going to put profits ahead of people. Or, worse, just their own narcissism ahead of, well, everything like Musk does. So I'm no fan. I like that space exploration is accelerating, but I'm very cynical about everything that's not genuine science.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 9:25 AM on April 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
Yeah, I just want to point out that the people who were giving tclark shit about his claim that the rocket should have self-destructed much earlier were wrong and very confidently so.
I was one of them and for a reason, this shit is heavily regulated by the FAA. If this is true, expect some heavy fines.
posted by Pendragon at 10:42 AM on April 30, 2023
I was one of them and for a reason, this shit is heavily regulated by the FAA. If this is true, expect some heavy fines.
posted by Pendragon at 10:42 AM on April 30, 2023
“Mars” is really just the fantasy of earth after billionaires make it uninhabitable for everyone but themselves and their favored lackeys.
posted by Artw at 11:07 AM on April 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Artw at 11:07 AM on April 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
Now that we know just how dirty this explosion was, how much in the way of pollutants rained down on the environments it was launched over, I want to point out again...
This was a massive methane explosion which involved 11,000 tons of debris of various sorts, some of it really problematic, and which violently distributed the contents of the spacecraft into the middle of the very delicate stratosphere which is already besieged by pollutants.
If I may quote the Cambridge University Press Environmental Conservation journal:
Persistent Stratospheric Warming Due to 2019–2020 Australian Wildfire Smoke:
The stratosphere is a vital and delicate part of our life support system. I'm thinking we should probably be more careful about blowing stuff up in it.
posted by MrVisible at 11:43 AM on April 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
This was a massive methane explosion which involved 11,000 tons of debris of various sorts, some of it really problematic, and which violently distributed the contents of the spacecraft into the middle of the very delicate stratosphere which is already besieged by pollutants.
If I may quote the Cambridge University Press Environmental Conservation journal:
Pollutants can reach the stratosphere in two ways: (1) by direct injection, as from supersonic transports, military aircraft, rockets, or nuclear bombs, and (2) by indirect injection from the troposphere, which may occur for inert, water-insoluble substances that will eventually work their way up into the stratosphere.We can add another source of pollution injection now:
The mass of catalysts sufficient to destroy stratospheric ozone at a significant, world-wide rate is less than the mass of the annual waste products from several industrial operations. In particular, the mass of nitrogen oxides from the exhausts of 500 supersonic transports is far above the threshold for significant catalytic destruction of ozone. This could have profound effects on the working and very maintenance of the biosphere.
Persistent Stratospheric Warming Due to 2019–2020 Australian Wildfire Smoke:
Plain Language SummaryNow that wildfires are getting larger and more frequent, this is becoming a disturbingly common event.
The 2019–2020 Australian bushfires injected a large amount of smoke that rose well into the stratosphere due to absorption of solar energy. A climate model is used to simulate the plume rise, transport, chemical, and climate impacts of the smoke from these massive bushfires. Simulations suggest that the smoke remained in the stratosphere for all of 2020 and that it measurably warmed the stratosphere by about 1–2 K for more than 6 months. The smoke particles were transported to high latitudes in the Southern Hemisphere and assuming similar heterogeneous reaction rates as sulfate aerosol should have produced about 4%–6% loss of the total column at high southern latitudes.
The stratosphere is a vital and delicate part of our life support system. I'm thinking we should probably be more careful about blowing stuff up in it.
posted by MrVisible at 11:43 AM on April 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
Correction: it was 11,000 pound of debris, not tons, which was detonated in the stratosphere creating enormous amounts of aerosolized whatever.
posted by MrVisible at 11:57 AM on April 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by MrVisible at 11:57 AM on April 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
> This being the pad that exploded and that pieces of which were flying through the air.
In case anyone missed it, here's a photo of the crater under what's left of the launch platform.
Turns out flame trenches and water suppression systems exist for a reason!
posted by automatronic at 2:35 PM on April 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
In case anyone missed it, here's a photo of the crater under what's left of the launch platform.
Turns out flame trenches and water suppression systems exist for a reason!
posted by automatronic at 2:35 PM on April 30, 2023 [3 favorites]
Scott Manley with a timely video: How To Destroy Wayward Rockets - Flight Termination Systems Explained.
posted by Pendragon at 3:30 PM on April 30, 2023
posted by Pendragon at 3:30 PM on April 30, 2023
And effective flight termination is very important if things go really wrong and instead of heading out to sea your rocket starts heading towards the hundreds of people living just five miles away. I do hope that the absurd amounts of toleration Musk has gotten from government agencies has run out, and nothing further is launched until the issues are genuinely fixed. But with our luck, the conclusion will be that the problem was that the government didn't let him bulldoze the nature refuge.
posted by tavella at 6:28 PM on April 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by tavella at 6:28 PM on April 30, 2023 [1 favorite]
Thanks for that Lupi link...
Yeah, particularly because it asked an important question: What is the booster for? The answer is essentially 'putting humans on Mars', but that's such a lofty goal.
Not that I'm against putting humans on Mars, but it's gonna be hella expensive and quite a stretch. The Moon would be better, IMO, but I get that it's not as exciting.
Even better would be to use Starship and SLS to lob several uncrewed probes and/or rovers at Jupiter and Saturn. Hell, all the planets (yes, this means you Pluto, you still matter to me). Doing that seems much more productive in the long run.
But yeah Elon, you need to fix your rocket in lot of ways, so get to it, please!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:50 PM on April 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
Yeah, particularly because it asked an important question: What is the booster for? The answer is essentially 'putting humans on Mars', but that's such a lofty goal.
Not that I'm against putting humans on Mars, but it's gonna be hella expensive and quite a stretch. The Moon would be better, IMO, but I get that it's not as exciting.
Even better would be to use Starship and SLS to lob several uncrewed probes and/or rovers at Jupiter and Saturn. Hell, all the planets (yes, this means you Pluto, you still matter to me). Doing that seems much more productive in the long run.
But yeah Elon, you need to fix your rocket in lot of ways, so get to it, please!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:50 PM on April 30, 2023 [2 favorites]
In a Twitter audio chat on Saturday, SpaceX's founder, Elon Musk, shared more details about what went awry during the first fully integrated Starship rocket and Super Heavy booster launch in April. One of the biggest revelations: The self-destruct setting took 40 seconds to work — a seemingly short time, except when you're uncertain if the massive rocket you just launched will blow up before hitting land. (Source)As I said above, this is really, really bad, and in addition to turning the launchpad into thousands of tons of shrapnel for no good reason, a termination system that doesn't work for 40 seconds is one that very easily could have not worked at all.
If the avionics for some unlikely reason regained some measure of aerodynamic control over the vehicle (how would you rate the likelihood of avionics regaining some control vs the termination system not responding for most of a full minute?), the rocket literally can end up anywhere its fuel can take it. And it was fueled for a near-orbital trip.
posted by tclark at 8:49 AM on May 1, 2023 [5 favorites]
To add, a low-heritage test rocket should not have been launched without an RSO with a finger on the Boom Button in the first place. Trusting an untested rocket to an automated system that worked on an entirely different, much smaller vehicle without a ground RSO as backup was colossally irresponsible.
posted by tclark at 9:01 AM on May 1, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by tclark at 9:01 AM on May 1, 2023 [3 favorites]
If some of us are assuming the termination failure might be the result of the damage that caused the booster to fail... that doesn't make it look better. That's why it's called a fail-safe.
If your rocket science strategy is to iterate through failures, then by god the one thing that you have to build to never fail from the get-go is the self-destruct mechanism. (Excepting, of course, when catastrophic failure does the job in its place. But 40 seconds of tumbling isn't that.)
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 9:06 AM on May 1, 2023 [5 favorites]
If your rocket science strategy is to iterate through failures, then by god the one thing that you have to build to never fail from the get-go is the self-destruct mechanism. (Excepting, of course, when catastrophic failure does the job in its place. But 40 seconds of tumbling isn't that.)
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 9:06 AM on May 1, 2023 [5 favorites]
I will say, the termination system failing is one of the few things that makes me hopeful that there will be serious review and enforcement of revisions this time around. Most of the agencies involved don't care if a wildlife refuge is wrecked or there are some possible health consequences down the line, or rather the people that care don't have power and the people who have power don't care or are too afraid of Musk. But even they likely have enough imagination to consider what the public and press reaction would be if they barbecue half the town of Port Isobel with a runaway rocket.
posted by tavella at 10:18 AM on May 1, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by tavella at 10:18 AM on May 1, 2023 [1 favorite]
If some of us are assuming the termination failure might be the result of the damage that caused the booster to fail... that doesn't make it look better. That's why it's called a fail-safe.
That's exactly the opposite of a fail-safe. Fail-safes mean that failures in a system cause it to safe itself. A fail-safe in a remote termination system ensures that the system absolutely cannot activate unless it is commanded to do so and that command is safe to act upon.
No reasonable regulator would tolerate a system like you're describing where the RTS fires if damaged. That would make it impossible to be near the rocket after the RTS was installed, such as to finish assembling it.
To be clear, Musk is an asshole, much of this test seems poorly considered, and one would expect that the apparent RTS failure is one of several things the FAA is going to yell at SpaceX about. Since it looks like it fired but was insufficient to promptly destroy the rocket, I'd think that specific yelling would be to put in bigger shaped charges.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:01 AM on May 1, 2023
That's exactly the opposite of a fail-safe. Fail-safes mean that failures in a system cause it to safe itself. A fail-safe in a remote termination system ensures that the system absolutely cannot activate unless it is commanded to do so and that command is safe to act upon.
No reasonable regulator would tolerate a system like you're describing where the RTS fires if damaged. That would make it impossible to be near the rocket after the RTS was installed, such as to finish assembling it.
To be clear, Musk is an asshole, much of this test seems poorly considered, and one would expect that the apparent RTS failure is one of several things the FAA is going to yell at SpaceX about. Since it looks like it fired but was insufficient to promptly destroy the rocket, I'd think that specific yelling would be to put in bigger shaped charges.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:01 AM on May 1, 2023
FAA faces lawsuit over SpaceX’s damage to local environment - The suit alleges that the FAA failed to adequately assess the environmental fallout from launches at SpaceX’s Starbase.
Which is fair, honestly. Here’s hoping it encourages them to stop giving Musk a free ride.
posted by Artw at 8:07 PM on May 1, 2023 [2 favorites]
Which is fair, honestly. Here’s hoping it encourages them to stop giving Musk a free ride.
posted by Artw at 8:07 PM on May 1, 2023 [2 favorites]
“No reasonable regulator would tolerate a system like you're describing where the RTS fires if damaged. That would make it impossible to be near the rocket after the RTS was installed, such as to finish assembling it.”
I did not describe an RTS system that was designed to fire if damaged, so we're good.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 12:22 AM on May 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
I did not describe an RTS system that was designed to fire if damaged, so we're good.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 12:22 AM on May 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
It sounds like the underlying problem in the RTS was the time it took from activation to rocket destruction and that the issue will be among the easiest to resolve. The bigger problem will be launch pad and engineering and environmental review of their proposed solution (a big water cooled steel plate). Musk wants to launch again in 2 months; but I suspect it will be at least 6.
posted by interogative mood at 7:20 AM on May 2, 2023
posted by interogative mood at 7:20 AM on May 2, 2023
It'll be interesting to see how hard the FAA comes down on SpaceX, particularly about the FTS. 40 seconds is a helluva long time.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:46 AM on May 2, 2023
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:46 AM on May 2, 2023
Apologies for misreading you!
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 9:13 AM on May 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 9:13 AM on May 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
My wording was poor, it's my fault.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 10:55 AM on May 2, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 10:55 AM on May 2, 2023 [1 favorite]
FAA faces lawsuit over SpaceX’s damage to local environment - The suit alleges that the FAA failed to adequately assess the environmental fallout from launches at SpaceX’s Starbase.
Thank goodness, I will donate to this Tribe. Either messed up, or totally appropriate, that they are fighting for the laws of the United States to be enforced.
Keep the treaties.
posted by eustatic at 6:18 PM on May 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
Thank goodness, I will donate to this Tribe. Either messed up, or totally appropriate, that they are fighting for the laws of the United States to be enforced.
Keep the treaties.
posted by eustatic at 6:18 PM on May 2, 2023 [2 favorites]
The Planetary Society's radio show (Planetary Radio) had a pretty interesting interview on this topic with ESG Hound this week.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 10:42 AM on May 6, 2023
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 10:42 AM on May 6, 2023
IIt Turns Out SpaceX and Tesla Get Way More Government Money Than NPR
posted by Artw at 2:17 PM on May 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Artw at 2:17 PM on May 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
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