5 ms·
If the problem is simply the seawater, you could use a large plastic liner to create a pool of fresh water floating in the sea, and land in that.
by sevenless 10y ago
If the problem is simply the seawater, you could use a large plastic liner to create a pool of fresh water floating in the sea, and land in that.
- mikeash 10y agoGiven the lack of fine guidance control that parachutes imply, your "large" plastic liner would have to be miles in diameter.
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- rtkwe 10y agoThat's a lot of complexity to add compared to the current landing which boils down at it's simplest to an inverted pendulum balancing problem, hard but the dynamics are pretty well understood. First parachute landings aren't super accurate without a lot of engineering and controls and would rely on calm or no winds down range wherever you're landing to have any chance of hitting the 'pool'. Second that pool would want to float and to my knowledge no one's made anything like that, so they'd have to invent and build then deploy a huge piece of engineering for every single launch.
- CydeWeys 10y agoThis pool of freshwater would need to be many kilometers in diameter to give a high chance of hitting it with an unpowered parachute descent (thanks to unpredictability of the winds). At this point you are talking about doing something that is much, much more expensive than the current approach of a powered landing. How are you going to get so much freshwater out into the sea, anyway? That's way more water than could be carried in the largest cargo ship that exists.
- lostlogin 10y agoA freshwater lake would seem easier
- mikeash 10y agoThere are remarkably few freshwater lakes in the Atlantic Ocean.
- jsnider3 10y agoLake Michigan seems like a pretty easy target and it's 100% American territory.
- mikeash 10y agoThe barge was located about 400 miles downrange of the launch site in this case, so if you're landing in Lake Michigan then you're launching from somewhere around western Iowa/Minnesota or eastern Nebraska/South Dakota. When your rocket goes off course or explodes, you'll rain parts and fuel down on Minneapolis or Chicago or whatever other inconvenient population happens to be in the way.
- CydeWeys 10y agoThis is a typical engineer conversation. "Oh, I'm sure I know a lot better than the accumulated centuries' worth of knowledge from actual rocket scientists, and I can come up with solutions to their problems based on no in-depth knowledge of the field and a minute's thought."