SpaceX (Vol. 2)

[Florida_Man]

Yes 50 miles approximately. The wife and I looked at each other as to say wtf was that then I realized there was a launch by on . Quick look on facebook and lots of people heard the sonic boom too

[rufmeister]

I was on Playalinda beach watching the launch today, simply breathtaking.

The sonic boom was superb, people around seemed to have forgotten it would happen.

Really enjoyable to watch, couldn’t believe how many people watched it, I thought it would be quiet as people see them all the time, how wrong I was.

[Florida_Man]

Playalinda is an amazing location to watch a rocket launch. I watched the Falcon Heavy demo launch from there a few years ago

[Hill92]

Hill92 said:

Everyday Astronaut (Tim Dodd) has just uploaded another Elon Musk interview and tour of Starbase.

https://youtu.be/3Ux6B3bvO0w

Part 2 (of 4) now uploaded. He's aiming to upload a part every two weeks.

https://youtu.be/XP5k3ZzPf_0

[Beati Dogu]

Good stuff, I'll watch it later.

He really needs to hire a professional editor. This was all filmed back in April.

[Ian974]

Just watched that a little earlier, always interesting to see this stuff up close.
The everyday astronaut channel seems a little sporadic with updates, but as it seems to be less frequent but longer more in depth videos I don't mind it too much, at least it's easy to keep up with!

[GTO-3R]

The view from up top of the tower is incredible and made the booster and ship look tiny!

How big are the catch arms though

[Beati Dogu]

I like how they call them chopsticks. A reference to Karate Kid where Mr Miagi is trying to catch a fly with a pair of chopsticks. When asked why, he says “Man who catch fly with chopstick, accomplish anything.”



They're 36m (~120 ft) long apparently.

[RizzoTheRat]

"Success is an option, we don't know the probability but its better than zero"

[annodomini2]

I liked the quote of:

"We like to turn the impossible into Late!"

[Beati Dogu]

Talking of late: The latest FAA delay has been announced. This one is “only” for two weeks though.

Their environmental assessment report on Starship operations should now be out on 13th June.

[Flooble]

I vaguely recall someone had worked out something like each delay was halving in length (2 month delay; 1 month delay; 2 week delay) so the next one will be a week's delay, then just a few days, then just a day, then just a few hours ...

[anonymous-user]

Flooble said:

I vaguely recall someone had worked out something like each delay was halving in length (2 month delay; 1 month delay; 2 week delay) so the next one will be a week's delay, then just a few days, then just a day, then just a few hours ...

Just like a countdown, you mean?

[Simpo Two]

garyhun said:

Flooble said:

I vaguely recall someone had worked out something like each delay was halving in length (2 month delay; 1 month delay; 2 week delay) so the next one will be a week's delay, then just a few days, then just a day, then just a few hours ...

Just like a countdown, you mean?

Like Moore's Law...

[loudlashadjuster]

Simpo Two said:

garyhun said:

Flooble said:

I vaguely recall someone had worked out something like each delay was halving in length (2 month delay; 1 month delay; 2 week delay) so the next one will be a week's delay, then just a few days, then just a day, then just a few hours ...

Just like a countdown, you mean?

Like Moore's Law...

Inverse Fibonacci

[jingars]

On 1st June NASA announced that it would purchase an additional five Crew Dragon missions.

No great surprise but a prudent move, given the intent to keep the ISS operational until 2030.

[Beati Dogu]

Interesting. SpaceX are part way through the 4th crew flight currently, then they'll have 10 more after that (The initial 6 crew flights + 3 more awarded in December 2021 to cover Starliner's delays + 5 more awarded in June 2022)

Boeing on the other hand, have the initial contract for 6 NASA crew flights - and that's it. Assuming they pass the crewed test flight later this year, their first full crew flight wouldn't be until around March 2023.

[xeny]

Beati Dogu said:

Boeing on the other hand, have the initial contract for 6 NASA crew flights - and that's it.

Are there any spare Atlas V launchers available to go beyond that? I wonder if Boeing have signalled they don't have the appetite for migrating to a new booster.

[MartG]

I believe that ULA don't want to pay for Vulcan to be man-rated, and neither does NASA...

Whether Congress force NASA to throw even more money at ULA or if ULA decides that it would like to remain part of the manned spaceflight industry so coughs up the cash for man-rating remains to be seen

[Beati Dogu]

I believe they have seven Atlas V rockets allocated for commercial crew flights (the manned test flight plus the six contracted flights). They have sold the remaining Atlas Vs now and will not be making any more. They probably don’t have any more Russian-built engines left, even if they wanted to build a couple more. They also only have 2 Starliners in operation.

The whole thing has been a debacle. I expect NASA wishes they could have gone with Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser space plane on Atlas instead. That’ll be flying cargo to and from the ISS via Vulcan from next year (probably)..

Starliner is also supposed to be a crew & cargo vehicle for the proposed Orbital Reef space station. This is a joint effort led by Blue Origin and Sierra Nevada. So either they’ll have to start human rating Vulcan, or New Glenn.