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Nikxice
Active Member
I did notice a subtle word change listed on the event calendar at the bottom of the live feed. Looks like SpaceX will no longer proceed "Landing Attempt" with the word "Experimental". One step closer to routine. Hopefully boring will become great for the bottom line!
My pleasure. This was about as perfect a launch, landing, and deployment as it gets. It made a most difficult GTO mission look easy. The booster looks in really great shape and it was close to an X marks the spot landing. This was a one engine landing burn. They said that a one engine burn uses more fuel but the booster lands much softer and can maneuver in strong winds better.
Hopefully we'll see some better footage of the actual landing sometime in the future.
Only a couple more weeks until the next launch.
Yesterday, I watched a few "flat Earth" videos crying that SpaceX is all faked. It was mind blowing that someone could be that sadly stupid. It doesn't take much reasoning skills and common sense to reason out the reality of SpaceX. His basic argument is "Give me a break" and "that's garbage." Not one shred of actual evidence.
A dislike is small compared to that....
Back to the subject. The technical webcast announced the landing almost immediately. The video was still in that pause when they made the announcement of a successful landing.
Chuq
Active Member
It's really sad that whenever I look for YouTube space videos for my kids - things like the SpaceX landings, Mars rovers, Apollo missions - the site is absolutely full of moon hoaxers and other such crap. I expect it's these kinds of morons.
The YouTube comment section is widely considered to be the garbage can of humanity. I tried streaming some political speeches and they included a "live chat" on the side of the stream. Thankfully, there was an option to hide it, because it was full of the most vitriolic trash I've ever read.
I think that's reasonable. It's been a fair number of launches since we asked "Can they land it?" Now we ask "Will something go wrong on the landing?"
At this point the main questions are:
1) When will they re-launch a 1st stage?
2) When will they do a test launch of Falcon Heavy?
3) When will they do a real launch of Falcon Heavy?
Just watched the webcast from last night. Excellent mission, happy to see all objectives accomplished so perfectly. Looking forward to hopefully seeing video of the stage touchdown, I assume that it was recorded by the cameras onboard OCISLY and we will see it when it returns to port.
These missions and stage recoveries are on their way to becoming routine, but I still find them exciting.
These missions and stage recoveries are on their way to becoming routine, but I still find them exciting.
Here is the accurate information that is out there:
1) Sometime in the fall. No date has been set but someone has paid for the payload launch. Who that is, is still not known. Gwynne Shotwell, about a week ago, said during a presentation that SpaceX would like to do two launches of re-used boosters this year. So likely within two or three months.
2) Rumors are out there that the late 2016 launch of the FH has slipped to early 2017. Some of that is the preparation of LC-39A. You can be sure that it won't be a large adjustment to the timetable as it has in the past.
3) I believe the first official launch of FH will be STP-2 for the military. They'll launch a cluster of military and scientific research satellites. That should be in early to mid 2017 if all goes well with the test demo launch.
I'm starting to believe that the landing video feed is purposely cut just before touchdown at this point. Probably to help maintain competitive advantage or save face if something does go wrong. I get that the drone ship loses it's satellite link when the booster is landing, but if they really wanted to show us they could either A: Use a helicopter/plane shot like they did back in April, or B: Have another drone ship nearby that acts as the satellite link and use normal radios to relay the video feed of OCISLY to the second satellite ship.
Not a huge deal really, but it's kind of frustrating watching the sky glow all fiery red and then a freeze frame, and then magically the booster is sitting on the ship. I get why the flat earth/SpaceX "Truthers" are making all those ridiculous claims.
Not a huge deal really, but it's kind of frustrating watching the sky glow all fiery red and then a freeze frame, and then magically the booster is sitting on the ship. I get why the flat earth/SpaceX "Truthers" are making all those ridiculous claims.
I get where you are coming from. It's frustrating for us viewers. However, look at it from SpaceX's perspective. Showing these videos does not make them any money. It's actually an expense. Elon and SpaceX still do it to promote space and the excitement of adventure. It is not a major priority for the company though. So they just do the best they can and leave it at that. The great chase plane video from CRS-8 is because NASA was involved and they have a chase plane SpaceX was allowed to use. SpaceX would have to hire a similar plane and then negotiate (pay and deal with regulations) to have it in the vicinity of the ASDS. I take SpaceX at their word that it is just the turbulence from the landing burn moving the satellite dish enough to disrupt the feed. Look at the camera vibration on a launch. I've seen cameras from over a mile out from the launch showing vibration. The dish is about 100 to 200 feet from exhaust of the booster.
Usually it's just a couple days then we get the video from one or more of the cameras on the ASDS.
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Krugerrand
Meow
That's not logical. Competitive advantage from who? That Jeff guy? ULA?
And SpaceX always releases the videos, including the crashes. Save face? Please. SpaceX tells us every single time why a landing fails. They even tell us why a particular mission fails or has had a partial failure.There's no reason for them to go to that trouble. It's an added cost and they show us the landings anyway, which they don't have to. They aren't trying to hide anything and they have no moral, ethical, monetary or other reason to show us the videos. They show the videos because Elon Musk wants to re-pique the interest of space, space exploration, and space travel in mankind. You just need to show a day or two of patience and then you'll get to see the video of the landing like everyone else who has Internet access on the planet.
That's not logical. Competitive advantage from who? That Jeff guy? ULA?
There's no reason for them to go to that trouble. It's an added cost and they show us the landings anyway, which they don't have to. They aren't trying to hide anything and they have no moral, ethical, monetary or other reason to show us the videos. They show the videos because Elon Musk wants to re-pique the interest of space, space exploration, and space travel in mankind. You just need to show a day or two of patience and then you'll get to see the video of the landing like everyone else who has Internet access on the planet.
Care to share the video from the last failure then? I recall seeing a grainy almost cellphone looking video from far away that cuts off, but I don't recall seeing anything from the actual ship. And you know they have a jillion camera's on there.
(I should add, they used to show the crashes afterwards, now they don't)
Again, I'm not proposing some tin foil conspiracy theory they aren't actually landing these, they most certainly are. They could just do a better job with what they have. Getting a chase plane isn't some logistical nightmare/crazy expensive proposition. It's a few thousand at best, and these launches are already in the millions of dollars.
You see exactly what they want you to see is all I'm saying. And yes, the competition is watching these, because SpaceX is now a legitimate player in the launch industry. ULA and the other handful of companies/governments that do this kind of stuff have a strong interest in seeing what they are up to as closely as possible.
Looking ahead a bit, let's say they decide that any previously launched first stage can be reused N times. The hardware cost of the first stage is then spread over N missions. They will be making many fewer first stages, but spend more time refurbishing them.
What happens after N flights then, since they obviously won't intentionally reuse until failure?
Say there is a 90% chance of success on flight N+1. Why not then use the stage to deliver low cost bulk goods to orbit for later use? Water comes to mind, or maybe Elon even has something in mind in connection with the upcoming Mars Colonial Transport. The big new rocket would be used to launch the hardware, and grab the required fuel from the "fuel depot".
RT
P.S. Loving the creeping level of monotony and routineness associated with these launches and landings. It is a good thing, and portends many new opportunities based on less expensive higher frequency launches. Exciting times indeed!
What happens after N flights then, since they obviously won't intentionally reuse until failure?
Say there is a 90% chance of success on flight N+1. Why not then use the stage to deliver low cost bulk goods to orbit for later use? Water comes to mind, or maybe Elon even has something in mind in connection with the upcoming Mars Colonial Transport. The big new rocket would be used to launch the hardware, and grab the required fuel from the "fuel depot".
RT
P.S. Loving the creeping level of monotony and routineness associated with these launches and landings. It is a good thing, and portends many new opportunities based on less expensive higher frequency launches. Exciting times indeed!
But it could be viewed that you are proposing a tin foil conspiracy theory that they're hiding landings on purpose.
I find it unlikely that there's much value in hiding the landing, success or failure. Are you suggesting that the competition will learn something from the failures in order to better compete? Or that SpaceX just doesn't like the idea of them celebrating in some room?
I don't know that you can say that they don't show them any more given that they've only failed to show one (June), and Musk tweeted a more distant shot. It's possible that the camera was destroyed by flying debris. It doesn't seem that they have many cameras, since we only see one shot. Cameras on the ship aren't going to help SpaceX much. The engineers need precise telemetry.
They are landing them. My "conspiracy" (which isn't really a conspiracy) is they aren't showing the moment of landing live by choice, even if later they do release video of the landings. It is well within their ability to show crystal clear live 4K video of the first stage landings (or failing to land) but they for whatever reason aren't. Perhaps because they just don't care, or perhaps because they want to be sure what they release is not going to give away any trade secrets. I have no idea. I just find it really funny that the most advanced privately financed space program that employs some of the smartest minds on the planet have decided to not show the moment of touchdown live for whatever reason.
I'm leaning towards the "They just don't care" side of things, since obviously they have the capability for the first stage to communicate to them in real time if things are going right or wrong at landing. The technical feed of the landing has the announcer saying it is safely on OCISLY 15-20 seconds before video is "re-established" and we see the rocket sitting safely on the drone ship.
