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SpaceX's first high-altitude test flight of its Starship rocket, which exploded last month while attempting to land after an otherwise successful test launch, violated the terms of its Federal Aviation Administration test license, the Verge reported on Friday, citing sources.
Neither than article nor the original Verge article says what rules they violated.
Is FAA the new SEC?one line of supposition is that FAA wants a new application every time spacex swaps an engine.
This would be problematic with superheavy + starship having dozens of engines. SpaceX wants to just do an application per flight and swap whatever hardware they need as needed.
the other common line of supposition is that FAA is concerned with exclusion zones and physical security (keeping people out of the exclusion zones).
either way apparently SN8 was the ship/flight that violated and triggered the FAA wrath. SN9 is just sitting around because of what already happened.
Where is the "sweet baby Jesus" button when you need it.Am partial to this image of it. Sweet baby Jesus...
This is INSANE -
I believe the plan is that Super Heavy boosters will have grid fins, but not flaps or landing legs. They will do a re-entry burn and landing burn similar to Falcon 9. They will then be caught by their grid fins using some sort of "arms" attached to the launch tower. Believe it or not.I lose track of all of the moving parts - is the intent that once this reaches production, this tower will be doing the belly flop thing when it returns to Earth?
What an amazing world and time we live in.I believe the plan is that Super Heavy boosters will have grid fins, but not flaps or landing legs. They will do a re-entry burn and landing burn similar to Falcon 9. They will then be caught by their grid fins using some sort of "arms" attached to the launch tower. Believe it or not.
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Congress raises concerns about FAA’s handling of Starship launch license violation
As SpaceX gears up for another Starship prototype test flight, the FAA is facing scrutiny from Congress for how it handled an earlier license violation.spacenews.com