I thought there was some venting out of a few engines prior to liftoff, which seemed non normal. Maybe a reason those didn't fire
SpaceX and other space news updates
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Last: 1 hr ago by txags92
Whoever that welder was, I want him for all my future projectsFireAg said:Yes, I get that...Starship was also supposed to separate, but didn't...FTAG 2000 said:The flip was planned. The booster is supposed to flip and come back after the launch.FireAg said:
That didn't look good at all...vehicle lost control about 2 min in and was finally destroyed by ground command...
The problem was Starship was still attached.
They still have a lot of work to do...
FireAg said:I wondered the same...it's possible that it was a line-of-sight issue from the commands being sent to actually being transmitted to the vehicle while it was flipping...tk for tu juan said:
That was the feed I was watching, and I was wondering why they were taking so long to terminate the flight. Amazing it held together thru all that additional stress
SRB-detonation was and still is a ground command from RSO (Range Safety Officer)...not automatic...
I thought everything was programmed on board, save the detonation.
That was an amazing! I wonder how good or bad the data is. Was it a good launch with some fixable failures, or was it an out of control disaster with inherent design flaws.?
I assume they don't need all 33 engines to perform a mission, but how many is enough? Are the remaining engines supposed to adjust their angles to keep it pointing up?
Looks to have a few "Pisa" characteristics, if you ask me...
Most things I've read have stated the goal was to get off the pad. Everything past that was icing.
Edit to add article citing Elon's goal of getting off the pad. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-65334810.amp
Edit to add article citing Elon's goal of getting off the pad. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-65334810.amp
3 didn't light. 4th failed T+0:40, 5th at T+1:01, 6th at T+1:40 but comes back at T+1:52, They were all except 1 interior on one side of the rocket which probably didn't help. But it lifted off, cleared the pad, it looks like the tower works, made it to max Q. That's a lot of major steps forward.FireAg said:
At least 3 engines didn't light...
At least 2 more flamed out on ascent...
It was during the Shuttle program, and I can't imagine they changed it for Artemis...FTAG 2000 said:FireAg said:I wondered the same...it's possible that it was a line-of-sight issue from the commands being sent to actually being transmitted to the vehicle while it was flipping...tk for tu juan said:
That was the feed I was watching, and I was wondering why they were taking so long to terminate the flight. Amazing it held together thru all that additional stress
SRB-detonation was and still is a ground command from RSO (Range Safety Officer)...not automatic...
I thought everything was programmed on board, save the detonation.
The detonation, in my mind, should have come earlier, and since it is a single-press ground command, I wonder if the vehicle struggled with communications as it tumbled, prior to receiving the detonation command...
will25u said:
Queued up the video to right before liftoff.
Go to T+26 and watch the bottom of the booster.
There was a small explosion, throwing off debris.
Trying to make sense of the shrapnel and debris right at lift off too. Maybe those outer ring raptors popped and wrecked some stuff too?
For a 'no payload' test mission I've read they could lose two at the tower and be fine. Clearly, 6 isn't ideal. It's interesting that at stage separation the real control loss was noticed.rynning said:
I assume they don't need all 33 engines to perform a mission, but how many is enough? Are the remaining engines supposed to adjust their angles to keep it pointing up?
The Falcon also had a critical loss (which almost killed the company) around that where the first stage came up and 'bumped' the second one after initial separation. I think it's a delicate balance of shutting down engines and preparing for the flip/the second stage heading out on its own. Trickier on a test flight with 33 1st stage engines and a quarter of them or so are out.
The tallest and most powerful rocket ever built launching. The liftoff of SpaceX Starship pic.twitter.com/meav59yVmn
— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) April 20, 2023
FTAG 2000 said:will25u said:
Queued up the video to right before liftoff.
Go to T+26 and watch the bottom of the booster.
There was a small explosion, throwing off debris.
Trying to make sense of the shrapnel and debris right at lift off too. Maybe those outer ring raptors popped and wrecked some stuff too?
T+29 to 34 is where this happens.
It's also where two of the raptors are out.
Sooooo…when do we do this again?
The old adage "Everything in Texas is bigger" still holds.
Yeah but the spec thrust on that is double and Atlas V. So crazy.nortex97 said:For a 'no payload' test mission I've read they could lose two at the tower and be fine. Clearly, 6 isn't ideal. It's interesting that at stage separation the real control loss was noticed.rynning said:
I assume they don't need all 33 engines to perform a mission, but how many is enough? Are the remaining engines supposed to adjust their angles to keep it pointing up?
The Falcon also had a critical loss (which almost killed the company) around that where the first stage came up and 'bumped' the second one after initial separation. I think it's a delicate balance of shutting down engines and preparing for the flip/the second stage heading out on its own. Trickier on a test flight with 33 1st stage engines and a quarter of them or so are out.
For those of you who are new to this thread, do please bear in mind that the odds were against this thing even clearing the pad. SpaceX launched an obsolete test article today and achieved some impressive feats: clearing the tower after losing multiple engines at liftoff, getting past Max Q, and Stage 1 attempting to reorient itself for boostback burn.
They also could never be sure of how the launch pad would handle the stress of launch, because it's nearly impossible to test the full stack at full thrust without, well, the vehicle lifting off. So yes, there's going to be debris, but they will learn a lot from figuring out what didn't blow up.
Today was to gather data and, only if every single thing went well, still end up in the ocean.
Also, the two locations for remote cameras for the launch photographers were just inside the fence and the location of the blown-over NSF remote camera. None of the photogs I spoke with expected their cameras inside the fence to survive, just hoped the memory cards would.
They also could never be sure of how the launch pad would handle the stress of launch, because it's nearly impossible to test the full stack at full thrust without, well, the vehicle lifting off. So yes, there's going to be debris, but they will learn a lot from figuring out what didn't blow up.
Today was to gather data and, only if every single thing went well, still end up in the ocean.
Also, the two locations for remote cameras for the launch photographers were just inside the fence and the location of the blown-over NSF remote camera. None of the photogs I spoke with expected their cameras inside the fence to survive, just hoped the memory cards would.
From EA feed, the rocket had a noticeable lean before it cleared the tower. And then toward the end right before when stage separation was supposed to happen, it looked like it was struggling to keep forward/upward momentum and had a big(around 25 degrees?) upward tilt like it was trying to fly higher and not on an escape velocity type trajectory.
I get it's a test flight, and I hope they achieved their goals with this, but if it is deemed a "success", it will be done merely on the basis that the bird got off the ground...aezmvp said:3 didn't light. 4th failed T+0:40, 5th at T+1:01, 6th at T+1:40 but comes back at T+1:52, They were all except 1 interior on one side of the rocket which probably didn't help. But it lifted off, cleared the pad, it looks like the tower works, made it to max Q. That's a lot of major steps forward.FireAg said:
At least 3 engines didn't light...
At least 2 more flamed out on ascent...
My hunch is the SpaceX engineers feel bittersweet right now...
I'm a veteran flight controller of over 30 Shuttle missions and 15 ISS expeditions at JSC...I lost two colleagues and friends on Columbia... Spaceflight is a risky business, and it's gut-wrenching for me to watch these things and them not be pristine... I get it, but it is still very hard... The public needs to be prepared for commercial spaceflight to cause some spectacular deaths on live TV during its infancy... Not a question of if, but when, unfortunately...
NASA and SpaceX approach rocket development very differently. SpaceX would rather launch something, have it blow up, learn from their mistakes, and build again. NASA had a completely different design philosophy where things needed to work the first time, since they knew the Soviets would be watching.
FireAg said:I get it's a test flight, and I hope they achieved their goals with this, but if it is deemed a "success", it will be done merely on the basis that the bird got off the ground...aezmvp said:3 didn't light. 4th failed T+0:40, 5th at T+1:01, 6th at T+1:40 but comes back at T+1:52, They were all except 1 interior on one side of the rocket which probably didn't help. But it lifted off, cleared the pad, it looks like the tower works, made it to max Q. That's a lot of major steps forward.FireAg said:
At least 3 engines didn't light...
At least 2 more flamed out on ascent...
My hunch is the SpaceX engineers feel bittersweet right now...
I'm a veteran flight controller of over 30 Shuttle missions and 15 ISS expeditions at JSC...I lost two colleagues and friends on Columbia... Spaceflight is a risky business, and it's gut-wrenching for me to watch these things and them not be pristine... I get it, but it is still very hard... The public needs to be prepared for commercial spaceflight to cause some spectacular deaths on live TV during its infancy... Not a question of if, but when, unfortunately...
Texags really does know things
You could see a a few of the engines having issues/flaming out during the ascent on the NSF feed. Space X feed had the graphic showing which engines were operating and you could see the ones that didn't operate at takeoff and which ones dropped out later, which was cool.
I wonder what the plan was for liftoff? I would have guessed the computers would have aborted liftoff if any of the engines hadn't started up....so either they had a preplanned number of engines that they would allow to fail and still liftoff or they failed just after the clamps were released?
I wonder what the plan was for liftoff? I would have guessed the computers would have aborted liftoff if any of the engines hadn't started up....so either they had a preplanned number of engines that they would allow to fail and still liftoff or they failed just after the clamps were released?
plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose
If you watch the launch, there's some pretty big somethings exploding upward from the ground around the T+4 to T+12 mark.will25u said:
From EA feed, the rocket had a noticeable lean before it cleared the tower. And then toward the end right before when stage separation was supposed to happen, it looked like it was struggling to keep forward/upward momentum and had a big(around 25 degrees?) upward tilt like it was trying to fly higher and not on an escape velocity type trajectory.
I know it's early armchair stuff but I wonder if the ground (concrete) or pad blew up, or I still lean towards them having some raptors blow on ignition, and that's what we see bouncing up.
As I mentioned, you can see at T+29 there's a hole burned through at the bottom of the booster and it's shedding debris outward.
I think we are going to find out they were damn lucky they didn't lose it on the pad.
ALSO... I know they weren't trying to reach actual escape velocity, but they were WAY OFF.
Escape velocity is 11.2 KM/s... They only achieved a little over 1800 KM/hr or 0.5 KM/s. Was Starship supposed to provide the rest of the thrust?
Escape velocity is 11.2 KM/s... They only achieved a little over 1800 KM/hr or 0.5 KM/s. Was Starship supposed to provide the rest of the thrust?
FireAg said:I get it's a test flight, and I hope they achieved their goals with this, but if it is deemed a "success", it will be done merely on the basis that the bird got off the ground...aezmvp said:3 didn't light. 4th failed T+0:40, 5th at T+1:01, 6th at T+1:40 but comes back at T+1:52, They were all except 1 interior on one side of the rocket which probably didn't help. But it lifted off, cleared the pad, it looks like the tower works, made it to max Q. That's a lot of major steps forward.FireAg said:
At least 3 engines didn't light...
At least 2 more flamed out on ascent...
My hunch is the SpaceX engineers feel bittersweet right now...
I'm a veteran flight controller of over 30 Shuttle missions and 15 ISS expeditions at JSC...I lost two colleagues and friends on Columbia... Spaceflight is a risky business, and it's gut-wrenching for me to watch these things and them not be pristine... I get it, but it is still very hard... The public needs to be prepared for commercial spaceflight to cause some spectacular deaths on live TV during its infancy... Not a question of if, but when, unfortunately...
SpaceX and NASA are asp two completely different organizations culture wise. NASA would over engineer and delay delay delay to not have things go wrong. So when they did it was a shock.
SpaceX operates on a keep it simple stupid, blow them up now and learn from it type approach.
This was a huge success.
Starship will provide a lot of the thrust, for sure, but I doubt they were anywhere near the speed they wanted to be at MECO.will25u said:
ALSO... I know they weren't trying to reach actual escape velocity, but they were WAY OFF.
Escape velocity is 11.2 KM/s... They only achieved a little over 1800 KM/hr or 0.5 KM/s. Was Starship supposed to provide the rest of the thrust?
I concur with this...leaning more toward "miracle" it lifted off...I think they got a bit lucky today...FTAG 2000 said:If you watch the launch, there's some pretty big somethings exploding upward from the ground around the T+4 to T+12 mark.will25u said:
From EA feed, the rocket had a noticeable lean before it cleared the tower. And then toward the end right before when stage separation was supposed to happen, it looked like it was struggling to keep forward/upward momentum and had a big(around 25 degrees?) upward tilt like it was trying to fly higher and not on an escape velocity type trajectory.
I know it's early armchair stuff but I wonder if the ground (concrete) or pad blew up, or I still lean towards them having some raptors blow on ignition, and that's what we see bouncing up.
As I mentioned, you can see at T+29 there's a whole burned through at the bottom of the booster and it's shedding debris outward.
I think we are going to find out they were damn lucky they didn't lose it on the pad.
Elon just said "in a few months."OKCAg2002 said:
Sooooo…when do we do this again?
So, take that as you will with various Elon-time calculations.
I hear you...I have different experiences...
It's all fun and games until they blow up humans onboard...and that is going to happen...nature of the biz...
Doesn't mean they should stop what they are doing, but there will be a real, human loss at some point, and that's gut-wrenching to me...
It's all fun and games until they blow up humans onboard...and that is going to happen...nature of the biz...
Doesn't mean they should stop what they are doing, but there will be a real, human loss at some point, and that's gut-wrenching to me...
Concur with this...bthotugigem05 said:Starship will provide a lot of the thrust, for sure, but I doubt they were anywhere near the speed they wanted to be at MECO.will25u said:
ALSO... I know they weren't trying to reach actual escape velocity, but they were WAY OFF.
Escape velocity is 11.2 KM/s... They only achieved a little over 1800 KM/hr or 0.5 KM/s. Was Starship supposed to provide the rest of the thrust?
My hunch is they have a certain number of engines required to at least achieve an Abort To Orbit (ATO) situation, where you have enough speed and escape velocity to achieve at least low Earth orbit... I don't think they got there today...
For the people near the launch, how loud was it?
Another re-watch, and at least some engines on first stage never shut off, even until RUD. So definitely had quite a bit of issues.
From one of the previous launched they had identified a threshold on minimum engines to go based on payload.Geddy Lee soul patch said:
You could see a a few of the engines having issues/flaming out during the ascent on the NSF feed. Space X feed had the graphic showing which engines were operating and you could see the ones that didn't operate at takeoff and which ones dropped out later, which was cool.
I wonder what the plan was for liftoff? I would have guessed the computers would have aborted liftoff if any of the engines hadn't started up....so either they had a preplanned number of engines that they would allow to fail and still liftoff or they failed just after the clamps were released?
From the SpaceX feed, they lost three at ignition (two on the outer edge, and one of the innermost interior engines.
An empty starship 2nd stage can very nearly reach orbit on it's own (as in, it gets to within a couple hundred mph of escape velocity based on what experts estimate), theoretically, as a SSTO vehicle.FireAg said:Concur with this...bthotugigem05 said:Starship will provide a lot of the thrust, for sure, but I doubt they were anywhere near the speed they wanted to be at MECO.will25u said:
ALSO... I know they weren't trying to reach actual escape velocity, but they were WAY OFF.
Escape velocity is 11.2 KM/s... They only achieved a little over 1800 KM/hr or 0.5 KM/s. Was Starship supposed to provide the rest of the thrust?
My hunch is they have a certain number of engines required to at least achieve an Abort To Orbit (ATO) situation, where you have enough speed and escape velocity to achieve at least low Earth orbit... I don't think they got there today...
The cut off altitude/speed for SH separation is much lower than with a F9 I have read. Can't remember what that is. This was intended to get to just barely sub-orbital by design so they wouldn't worry about losing control and it being 'stuck' unsafely there.
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