Deep Space and Interplanetary Exploration - Houston, we are go for launch!

[Bedwyr]

I'm quoting from smeone quoting from elsewhere, so can't give proper attribution, but apparently folks internal to SpaceX considered the test successful if it cleared the pad.  One trusts their instrumentation tells them lots.

33 engines in proximity is an awful lot of shaking going on - that, and the accellerated test program, killed the Soviet N1.  By comparison, the current (!) Soyuz launcher has 20 engines in five clusters of 4 - one cluster in the core, and one cluster in each of the "carrots". 1900+ flights since 1966, so the issues can be addressed.

I believe they announced as such and Eric Berger reported as such, yeah. And it was successful. But the launchpad issues were known with a lot of skepticism. I assumed the SpaceX boffins knew something I didn't, but maybe it was just the difficulty of solving the problem in an area with a really high water table. Either way this design is just not gonna work. Learning!

Re: Soyuz: isn't that simplified by the fact that the main engines don't gimbal and it steers via vernier engines like the Atlas?

[worktroll]

That was ... extremely annoying, thanks to the Austin Powers-style soundtrack. The sounds and images of the actual impact were of great interest.

There are many, larger chains of craters around Mars' equator. They're believed to be shattered 'moons' - asteroids, captured much like Phobos and Deimos, and dragged inside the Roche limit.

[Prospernia]

So, I guess the Space X explosion is what happens when you score a critical-hit to the engine of a Union-Class dropship when it's trying to take off.

[Luciora]

Venus has been very prominent over here, so took a picture of it with the Crescent moon

[Daryk]

Nice pic!

[Bedwyr]

The crater from the launch was deeper than I thought. Via Twitter:

A mean thought just occurred. Would rocket blast causing a crater this deep kill Natasha? I think it would.  >:D

[rebs]

Natasha's death was truly novel - there are no game rules to recreate THAT crap, lol.

But still, it's acceptable because the only person meaner and more embittered than her in the entire IP was the one who put her to the torch.

[Natasha Kerensky]

A mean thought just occurred. Would rocket blast causing a crater this deep kill Natasha?

Neg.

[Wrangler]

Couple different pictures.

Hakuto-R mission picture from Luna orbit of the Moon and Earth. (The probe has not responded, after it had landed.)


Hope Probe from the UAE got an amazing view of the moon Deimos in Mars orbit.

[ANS Kamas P81]

Deimos is shockingly smooth for something without an atmosphere.  I'd have expected it to look more like Luna myself, pockmarked with craters everywhere.

[rebs]

It's highly unusual, indeed.  But these are great images.

[rebs]

Here's a HUGE "IF".  But if possible, what a breakthrough for physics and science in general.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/we-might-soon-be-able-to-see-missing-ripples-in-spacetime/ar-AA19nrwM?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=a3b4e6f1b965445abf2c5f15516c1c18&ei=26

[worktroll]

Deimos is shockingly smooth for something without an atmosphere.  I'd have expected it to look more like Luna myself, pockmarked with craters everywhere.

Mars' moons are surprisingly low density. It's probably mainly rubble and dust by now.

[Daryk]

Heh... who would have guessed the solution for better resolution was a longer baseline?  ::)

[wantec]

The crater from the launch was deeper than I thought. Via Twitter:




I think this will be one of the primary focus points going forward. I'll bet money debris was the cause of a fair amount of engine damage. Maybe not all, but the failures further up were definitely affected by it. The vehicle was clearly unable to control itself at some point and went end-over-end.

That crater is b/c SpaceX has nowhere near enough water flow protecting the concrete from the heat blast, blast pressure, and sound vibration of all those engines. For NASA's SLS the IOPSS system floods the mobile launch pad and flame diverter with about 450,000 gallons in less than 45 seconds, with a peak flow of over 1,000,000 gal/min. This video starts showing a test without the mobile launcher attached, but you can see the volume of water that flows https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuFn8sPFdTs BTW, those vertical pipes are 54" (4'-6") in diameter. That looks like roughly 1.37 meter diameter pipe.

As for the rocket failing to reach stage separation, SpaceX has long gone by the process of making lots of designs and being ok if they aren't instantly successful early in the process b/c they say they can learn as much or more from a failure than a successful test/launch. How many tests of the starship vertical landing process did they go through before it was successful? Same for landing Falcon 9 at land and on droneships.

[Wrangler]

From my understanding was from reports I've read.  Separation was abandoned due too the explosion after take off of one of the hydraulic controllers on the side of the Booster, which caused the Super Heavy vehicle to be unable to gimble it's center engines.   I believe had it not lost that, the rocket could have gotten high enough to separate.  From what I understood was, once it became apparent they lost control of the booster. They abandoned effort to separate stage 2 aka the Starship. 

However, it was outright stupid thing to do gamble launch site on withstanding the thrust of the engines blasting down on it.  I always though that was bone head move by Musk because he was in a rush to launch and test.  Now unfortunately, the company is paying for it.  Hopefully, they learned enough to fix the other tower in Florida or make new site with proper flame diverter.  This cooling plate Musk wants to use is likely not too work, but I'm no engineer or scientist.

[rebs]

Here we have the closest ever observation of a singularity devouring a star.

What was unusual about this one was that it was noticed that infrared was seen to have shown the most activity, indicating that scientists may have been watching the wrong spectrum on most other observations of this same type of event.   

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/eerie-flash-reveals-a-black-hole-eating-a-star-the-closest-ever-seen/ar-AA1azMj5

[Daryk]

Nice find!  :thumbsup:

[wantec]

From my understanding was from reports I've read.  Separation was abandoned due too the explosion after take off of one of the hydraulic controllers on the side of the Booster, which caused the Super Heavy vehicle to be unable to gimble it's center engines.   I believe had it not lost that, the rocket could have gotten high enough to separate.  From what I understood was, once it became apparent they lost control of the booster. They abandoned effort to separate stage 2 aka the Starship. 

However, it was outright stupid thing to do gamble launch site on withstanding the thrust of the engines blasting down on it.  I always though that was bone head move by Musk because he was in a rush to launch and test.  Now unfortunately, the company is paying for it.  Hopefully, they learned enough to fix the other tower in Florida or make new site with proper flame diverter.  This cooling plate Musk wants to use is likely not too work, but I'm no engineer or scientist.

I'm sure they won't be allowed to launch Starship at Pad 39A in Florida until they have upgraded the ground service equipment. Right now the Falcon 9 launch tower at Pad 39A is the only place that SpaceX (and by extension NASA) can launch crew to the ISS. Now SpaceX has 2 other Falcon 9 launch pads (Pad 40 in Florida and one at Vandenburg in California), but neither of those are setup to load & launch crew. With that in mind, I highly doubt NASA would allow any kind of launch or even static fire in Florida until it's plainly proved they won't blast the launch site to pieces.

[Prospernia]

The the UAE and China getting to the space-exploration game, late, I actually enjoy what they are doing, even though some of it's redundant, it still is a step in the right direction.

[rebs]

I just hope that all the haste to dominate space doesn't lead to a Kessler Event.  Whether it's through rushed and/or shoddy development and engineering, or through ill-thought out belligerence.

[rebs]

Check out this Logarithmic Star Chart!

[Wrangler]

Another view of Deimos, Photo released by NASA's High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

[rebs]

Deimos seriously looks like a smoothed beach rock with the few small craters being fossilized "bubbles" eroding to the surface.

I've seen things like this on the shores of Lake Huron and Lake Michigan.

[Prospernia]

Deimos seriously looks like a smoothed beach rock with the few small craters being fossilized "bubbles" eroding to the surface.

I've seen things like this on the shores of Lake Huron and Lake Michigan.

Deimos surface looks like this, actually:

[rebs]

This is a freaking AMAZING image of the star Formalhaut (Not pictured is the SLDF Formalhaut Corps), courtesy of NASA and the JWST.  Those bands of dust and debris stretch for 14 billion miles around the primary.

Check out this article while you're at it!

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/nasa-s-james-webb-snaps-stunning-images-of-a-star-25-light-years-away/ar-AA1aU45J?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=58ed45d5e5234cccb278791682212668&ei=37#image=1

[Daryk]

Stunning indeed!  :thumbsup:

[rebs]

Here is a link to a video of JWST views of Titan.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/saturn-s-moon-titan-captured-by-the-james-webb-space-telescope/vi-AA1b0JhX?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=8a06a3d93f53433c8c7eee3cedaf3580&ei=32

[rebs]

Betelgeuse has undergone a 50% increase in apparent magnitude. 

Check it out here...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/earth-s-neighboring-star-betelgeuse-unexpectedly-got-50-brighter-part-of-a-weird-process-that-will-end-in-the-dying-star-going-supernova/ar-AA1bJuqQ?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=f0163280a38b4441b1b2509545f16fb0&ei=73 ;)

[worktroll]

Yup, any day now - in the next 10,000-100,000 years, it's going to pop!