And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Saturday, November 18, 2023
SpaceX Starship launches on 2nd integrated test flight, booster explodes.
"Rapid unscheduled disassembly" or RUD is a joke that Elon Musk pulled years ago and people still use for some reason. Everyone who pays attention to this stuff knows it's just another way of saying, "it done blowed up."
I think it was about as successful as anyone might wish. The booster looked fantastic the whole way. All 33 engines lit and stayed lit for the full almost three minutes. The new hot-staging approach worked. The Starship upper stage made it into space at 88 miles. That's not being in orbit, but it was billed as a suborbital test. The tourists at Blue Origin or Virgin Galactic pay to get above 50 miles, and the Karman line definition of space is 62 miles (100 km).
It's premature to guess at what went wrong, but it looks like they fixed the flight termination system incorrectly. On flight 1, it wouldn't blow the ship up when commanded. Now it blew it up for no apparent reason. It's possible there were reasons, we just don't know yet.
SpaceX is reinventing the space business as it goes. The 60s rockets were one way trips that took months and years to build, that cost a fortune per launch, and lifted tiny payloads. SpaceX is building them to reuse many times on short turnarounds, meet cost targets, and haul lots of stuff. Different kind of rocket. Last year their Falcon 9s lifted more payload into orbit than the rest of the world put together. Starship/Super Heavy dwarf the Falcon 9.
"an unscheduled disassembly" She's a master at b/s
ReplyDelete"Rapid unscheduled disassembly" or RUD is a joke that Elon Musk pulled years ago and people still use for some reason. Everyone who pays attention to this stuff knows it's just another way of saying, "it done blowed up."
DeleteI think it was about as successful as anyone might wish. The booster looked fantastic the whole way. All 33 engines lit and stayed lit for the full almost three minutes. The new hot-staging approach worked. The Starship upper stage made it into space at 88 miles. That's not being in orbit, but it was billed as a suborbital test. The tourists at Blue Origin or Virgin Galactic pay to get above 50 miles, and the Karman line definition of space is 62 miles (100 km).
It's premature to guess at what went wrong, but it looks like they fixed the flight termination system incorrectly. On flight 1, it wouldn't blow the ship up when commanded. Now it blew it up for no apparent reason. It's possible there were reasons, we just don't know yet.
this was one of his over NE North Carolina c.two years ago. Looking south, the craft on a NE trajectory.
ReplyDeleteoops, here:
Deletehttps://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f0b8b9083f19ca9c89283edfe578b305ac6e9a652adc6b8225a744c7fe6b8e93.jpg
Unscheduled dissassembly, I'm stealing that
ReplyDeleteIt's amazing. If we supposedly nailed this in the late '60s, why all the problems now? If Kubrick weren't assassinated, he would have the answer.
ReplyDeleteSpaceX is reinventing the space business as it goes. The 60s rockets were one way trips that took months and years to build, that cost a fortune per launch, and lifted tiny payloads. SpaceX is building them to reuse many times on short turnarounds, meet cost targets, and haul lots of stuff. Different kind of rocket. Last year their Falcon 9s lifted more payload into orbit than the rest of the world put together. Starship/Super Heavy dwarf the Falcon 9.
DeleteI love that Musk is making rocket ships that land on their tails just like the TV shows I watched as a kid.
DeleteWait for the FOOM!
ReplyDeleteThere's always a FOOM!
And while we're up, what dirt, exactly, did that booster have on the Clinton Family Crime Syndicate?