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Crew Dragon launch escape demonstration
- mechhacker 7y ago4 chutes are currently out and just waiting for splashdown now. Looks like the test went well. Edit: Splashdown
- sidcool 7y agoSeems all went well! Kudos SpaceX
- whoisthemachine 7y agoWhile the tried and true method of splashing down in the ocean seems like a reasonable first effort for landing the dragon spacecraft, watching the difficulty the boats have in reaching the spacecraft (the hosts of the stream mentioned it takes them 2 hours!), and the difficulty the SpaceX team had in getting reasonable weather conditions for this test, it seems to me that a propulsive land-based landing would still be a reasonable future improvement to pursue.
- davedx 7y agoIf you were the astronaut and it was an emergency that triggered the abort (e.g. the launch vehicle blew up like the Falcon 9 just did), would you really prefer the Dragon tried to land instead of at sea? Keep in mind it wouldn't be able to choose its landing site either.
- whoisthemachine 7y agoAs I replied elsewhere, for an abort, a water landing definitely makes sense (and is likely the only reasonable option). I was merely commenting on how drawn out the recovery process is after splashdown, which I would assume would be less time-consuming with a land landing.
- mechhacker 7y agoThat would require significantly more fuel and a different design, likely limiting the Dragon's crew payload. This abort happened after the rocket reached max Q (highest dynamic pressure) when it was flying East (and still upward, but to get to orbit you must fly sideways over water). Returning West to get back over land would be fuel prohibitive on a fully loaded crew capsule. The reusable falcon 9 stages have almost nothing in them when they fly back to land. See trajectories: https://i.redd.it/xaisqxao5ef01.png https://i.redd.it/xaisqxao5ef01.png
- whoisthemachine 7y agoFor an abort, a water landing definitely makes sense. Perhaps there is no way to avoid the tough weather requirements for the downrange abort. The lengthy recovery time still seems due to the water landing, however. I wonder if it will be a 2 hour recovery time during normal water landing?
- whoisthemachine 7y agoI still wonder how much more difficult it is to get proper weather conditions over open sea vs. land when preparing to land during a normal flight. I'd imagine strong winds become stronger over sea than over land, and of course, the ability for ships to reach you in choppy seas becomes much more difficult.
- shkkmo 7y agoThat was the original end plan, but AFAIK it was mixed a couple of years ago. “The reason we decided not to pursue (powered landings) heavily is it would have taken a tremendous amount of effort to qualify that for safety, particularly for crew transport,” Musk said. “And then there was a time when I thought that the Dragon approach to landing on Mars, where you’ve got a base heat shield and side-mounted thrusters, would be the right way to land on Mars, but now I’m pretty confident that is not the right way, and that there’s a far better approach.” [0] [0] https://spaceflightnow.com/2017/07/19/propulsive-landings-nixed-from-spacexs-dragon-spaceship/ https://spaceflightnow.com/2017/07/19/propulsive-landings-ni...
- lutorm 7y agoTo be clear, propulsively landing after an abort was never planned -- you've already used up the fuel doing the abort. Plus, depending on when you abort, you could be half-way across the Atlantic.
- mechhacker 7y agoDo you know if they had a path for redundancy for a propulsive abort? With 4 parachutes, they likely have the design able to handle a single 'chute failure. Not sure what would be involved with single failures on the propulsive abort but that may have been a large contributor to go with the required return fuel.
- greglindahl 7y agoThe propulsion is pairs of engines for redundancy, but, as people keep on saying, abort was always going to be parachutes.
- lutorm 7y agoThe abort is the redundancy... ;-) I'm not sure what specifically you are thinking about, but in general since an abort is already one critical fault away from the nominal case, I believe the requirements for redundancy are lower.
- fit2rule 7y agoI think you misunderstood the announcer - the recovery takes 2 hours, but that's not how long it takes the boats to get to the capsule at its splashdown location. The boats get there pretty quickly. The time required is for safety checks and so on - there's some pretty nasty materials involved in those thruster engines, and all that stuff has to be checked first.
- whoisthemachine 7y agoInteresting, so given this do you think that a normal landing would not have as long of a recovery time, given that it won't use those thruster engines?
- greglindahl 7y agoFor a normal landing, there’s an extra step of hoisting the entire capsule onto the ship before opening the hatch.
- skunkworker 7y agoIn addition to this. The Air Force has personnel that can jump out of the plane with flotation, medical equipment and food in order to survive for an extended period of time on the ocean while it may take a few hours to get fast boats and recovery teams there.
- C14L 7y agoNASA didn't require it. There was an early plan at SpaceX to have Crew Dragon land propulsivly, but they didn't pursue it in favor of developing Starship and SuperHeavy faster. That's what Musk said in an interview some time ago.
- whoisthemachine 7y agoI remember that. It still seems to make sense to research propulsive landings and gain NASA's approval for them eventually (while maintaining the well-proven water landing capability) if it would cut costs significantly.
- greglindahl 7y agoLosing science return cargo from a landing failure during testing is a no-no.
- C14L 7y agoFrom what I remember, after Dragon2 is approved by NASA, all development efforts of SpaceX will be focused on Starship and Super Heavy only. Dragon2 is no use in the efforts to build a city on Mars. And even for a Moon colony, its too small. Its just there to earn money from flying people to the ISS and back. And for that its already good enough.
- jessriedel 7y agoBoeing's Starliner lands on solid ground after a normal mission while SpaceX's Dragon lands in the ocean. But that's not relevant to an in-flight abort. Any abort at this stage in the launch (whether Boeing or SpaceX) has to come down over water. That's simply where the trajectory of the launch goes.
- whoisthemachine 7y agoAs I replied elsewhere, for an abort, a water landing definitely makes sense (and is likely the only reasonable option). I was merely commenting on how drawn out the recovery process is after splashdown, which I would assume would be less time-consuming with a land landing.
- Fronzie 7y agoIn the introduction of the space-x launch broadcast, they mention that in real aborts, military will be involved. With helicopters, rescue personnel will be dropped of. Also there, it still takes a while for boats to arrive.
- brianwawok 7y agoYour odds of hitting something hard are much higher on land. Or smooshing someone.
- Already__Taken 7y agoWas crew dragons plan back with normal propulsive landings to always fly back to ground and just load more fuel?
- _ph_ 7y agoMy understanding is, that the Nasa didn't like the idea of propulsive landing. As the dragon capsule is purely for supporting the ISS, SpaceX has no incentive to spend money on anything they are not using for the Nasa missions. For everything else, they are developing the Starship. If that program goes as planned, the dragon capsule will be used only for a short time, I guess.
- iso1824 7y ago> If that program goes as planned, the dragon capsule will be used only for a short time, I guess. I can't see Starship being approved for Nasa use by 2024 even if it were flying today.
- JshWright 7y agoWhy not? It didn't take that long to certify Dragon, and most of the delays were on SpaceX (like blowing up the capsule they were originally intending to use for this test).
- Klathmon 7y agoI believe SpaceX isn't working with NASA to get Starship human rated by them. I think they are trying to do it 100% private, partially so they don't need to prove it to NASA's standards.
- grey-area 7y agoit seems to me that a propulsive land-based landing would still be a reasonable future improvement to pursue. They're working on a second stage that can carry a few more astronauts and land itself, it's a bit bigger though ;) https://www.spacex.com/starship https://www.spacex.com/starship
- whoisthemachine 7y agoYes, I'm well aware of that! Hopefully, they get that flying so soon that pursuing more advanced landing methods for the dragon is not needed :)
- whoisthemachine 7y agoInterestingly, in the press conference, Musk mentioned that SpaceX would like to try to catch spacecraft, which I would think would reduce some of the water landing costs.
- busymom0 7y ago> watching the difficulty the boats have in reaching the spacecraft (the hosts of the stream mentioned it takes them 2 hours!) From my understanding, the host meant that getting the dragon and crew back to the shore would take 2 hours, not the recovery boat to get to them. They could probably even have helicopters around the area which could fly and pick the dragon up.
- davedx 7y agoNailed it! Can't wait for the crewed launch. Historic moment for the United States space program.
- shkkmo 7y agoAny idea when that will get approved?
- lhoff 7y agoI heard that the first flights are scheduled for first quarter 2020 if everything goes well today, which it from the first look did.
- olmideso 7y agoAt the press conference Elon said that all remaining tests are expected to be finished by the end of Q1 2020 and the first flight is expected to launch in Q2. Of course they have to analyze the data from today's test. Also the flight can be delayed if NASA decides to extend astronauts' time on ISS which would require additional training for them.
- vsareto 7y agoWhy did the booster explode? No thrust causing it to lose direction?
- shkkmo 7y agoIt lost it's areodynamic nose cone and so started to tumble.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- hoorayimhelping 7y agoThe pointed nosecone on the top of the rocket came off and it lost aerodynamic stability, and started to tumble. The tumbling caused the fuel and oxydizer to slosh around the very thin (and lightweight) tanks that are not designed with withstand that kind of force. The sloshing accelerated the tumbling. The thin tanks rupture causing the fuel and oxidizer to mix in the vicinity of a lit rocket engine. BOOM.
- code4tee 7y agoGiven the velocity it was going the capsule popping off the top basically turned the rest of the rocket into a supersonic flying brick. The amount of drag would be enormous and the rest of the ship basically just tore itself apart. As soon as the oxidizer and fuel combined in the crumbing mess you get a big explosion. That was all expected to happen and why they launch these things out over the ocean. These rockets also usually have a self-destruct mechanism that a range safety officer can trigger if the rocket starts coming back towards land.
- beached_whale 7y agoIt was really interesting how they setup the main chutes to open slowly to minimize the shock from breaking.
- iso1824 7y agoLooked exactly like KSP
- pier25 7y agoHistory in the making.
- lhoff 7y agoPodcast recommendation for all german speakers here. Tim Pritlove recently interviewed Hans Koenigsmann (Engineer and Vice President of Mission Assurance at SpaceX since 2011). The episode was released two days ago. They talk about the history of Space X and the future planes (Mars mission and Starlink). Its part of the Podcast "Raumzeit". https://raumzeit-podcast.de/2020/01/17/rz083-spacex/ https://raumzeit-podcast.de/2020/01/17/rz083-spacex/
- _Microft 7y agoVery worthwhile if one is interested in rockets and SpaceX in particular. The interview was summarized in English on the SpaceX subreddit. https://old.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/epzayc/german_raumzeit_podcast_with_hans_koenigsmann/feobsfz/ https://old.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/epzayc/german_raumz...
- code4tee 7y agoLooks like a total success. Great job.
- Tepix 7y agoIt looks good so far but we won't really know until the telemetry has been looked at. For example the g-forces on the astronauts could have exceeded the safe limits.
- rrmm 7y agoI believe the recovery teams have to meet the proper deadlines as well.
- Already__Taken 7y agoThe webcast said the US air force normally gets the crew, did I miss-hear?
- rrmm 7y agoThat might be the case. I was assuming based on some comments I vaguely recall following the DM-1 capsule recovery. EDIT: https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/01/16/spacex-abort-test-serves-as-practice-run-for-astronauts-rescue-teams/ https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/01/16/spacex-abort-test-serv... has more details about the recovery operations and the Air Force's role.
- vermontdevil 7y agoDuring press conference, they said the highest the g forces hit was 3.5
- skunkworker 7y agoIsn’t that similar to a roller coaster?
- ianai 7y agoAnybody suspect this impacts Tesla stock? Not that it should, but as a herd reaction.
- greglindahl 7y agoMy herd reaction is that I am distressed to see this kind of thread in a SpaceX discussion.
- derrikcurran 7y agoWhy? Investment in Tesla is probably good for SpaceX in the long term.
- ianai 7y agoWe’re here to discuss the latest Musk-backed company’s achievement. There’s a huge interest in all things Musk. To the point that everything he does seems widely related - I mean how many people here are rooting for his dream of a Mars colony? So I asked whether it could affect another Musk company. It’s related.
- natch 7y agoYou asked if it could "impact" the stock which is commonly understood as meaning a downward impact. Even setting aside the fact that they are different companies, I don't see how a successful demonstration could do that, no. If anything, if you want to make it about Musk and not the specific companies, it should give people more confidence in Musk since it went exactly as planned.
- ianai 7y agoImpact per google: “2. have a strong effect on someone or something” No indication of direction. Lacking this distinction, the direction is implicit from a successful test to be positive.
- 7y ago
- soheil 7y agoThe explosion was unexpected so either they will have to fix what went wrong there, which in turn will possibly effect the design which would then most likely need another flight test if you want to be safe enough or they will let it be as is which would be unsafe? They expected the splashdown to happen several seconds later than it did. This could mean the capsule was going faster than it should have before its parachute deploy or it didn't slow down enough when hitting the water which would be worse. Finally the main parachutes where touching each other pretty aggressively it wouldn't seem than unfathomable that two or more of them get tangled up, I don't think there is a backup solution for if that happens.
- inamberclad 7y agoThe explosion was fine and expected. They mentioned this in the livestream, although it looks like the FTS and not aerodynamic forces. Either way, it happened after the capsule was well clear. Regarding splashdown timing, we will see. They've been testing this extensively in the background, and parachutes have been a pain point all around.
- soheil 7y agoThe explosion seemed very much like a controlled detonation and not a breakdown of the rocket as it falls through the atmosphere as was mentioned in the livestream so it seemed like an unplanned or unexpected explosion.
- ddevault 7y agoThis is nonsense. The rocket was expected to explode. That's basically the only thing it can do once the dragon escapes.
- soheil 7y agoIt is insane how willfully someone with over 20k karma points on HN ignores the details of what I'm referring to (the manner in which it exploded not that it exploded) and bluntly assumes the dumbest thing possible about a somewhat neutral statement.
- irjustin 7y agoCongratulations to the SpaceX and the whole team! That moment of truth when the thrust was lost and the module separated was actually way faster than I had expected. I could barely notice the exhaust plume was smaller and the dragon had already left. I think it's incredibly satisfying to note that SpaceX is so good at the launch sequence with the Falcon 9 that there were zero delays except weather. With any new rocket system test, I completely expect there to be multiple delays with the countdown. Again, congrats to everyone and their hard work.
- 51Cards 7y agoI was also amazed by this until I watched the post press conference. Elon seemed to describe in an answer to Everyday Astronaut that the launch abort sequence was set to trigger at a specific speed/altitude and that it was the abort program that told the engines to shut down. I would like to see that clarified further but I watched that segment twice and it seems that the abort system was in control, and step 1 was shut down the main engine, step 2 - pressurize/start the abort engines, and so on.
- irjustin 7y agoThat also could mean, while the abort system said "shut down", the thing that said "get away" was not directly connected, but still using sensor/telemetry inputs as the decision maker. Also, I'm really interested in knowing if the fireball was performed by the automated abort system. I would love these to be the answer, so looking forward to clarification.
- 51Cards 7y agoThat is my question too, if the abort system just went "Step 1, Step 2, etc." or if the abort system went "Step 1" and the automated processes took over from there. It wasn't entirely clear but it felt like the first one which is why I watched it again. As for the fireball, from the press conference I got the sense that the fireball was not triggered manually, that the rocket just broke up. Again, on neither I'm 100% sure.
- 7y ago
- rrmm 7y agoThe post-test press conference is starting on nasa tv for those interested (11:50EST).
- _Microft 7y agoThere will be a press conference at 11:30 AM (ET) on https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive by the way. One thing that is clear is that the phrase of launching American astronauts on American rockets from American soil will be used. Multiple times. That's as sure as SpaceX livestream hosts using the formulation 'Historic' Launch Complex 39A ;)
- rrmm 7y agoAll smiles at the press conference, so seems like things went well. Elon says, Hardware for first launch will be ready end of Feb, but lots of double checks have to happen before launch and schedules lined up for ISS. Expect launch to happen in 2Q. Elon adds that they need to get the space craftback and check it over to make sure all is well and there is nothing to address. Elon teases trying to catch the dragon on re-entry to remove some of the constraints a splash down imposes.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- growlist 7y agoI love this idea - caught gently with the ship immediately turning back for home, like something out of James Bond.
- NeutronStar 7y agoElectron has been trying to do this with their own rocket.
- rbanffy 7y ago> Elon teases trying to catch the dragon on re-entry Worth remembering the Crew Dragon wouldn't need a major redesign to do a powered landing. That's one of the reasons why the escape system uses liquid fuel - it needs to be throttlable - instead of a simpler solid fuel design.
- ericcumbee 7y ago
- xt00 7y agoIt was somewhat eerie to hear the “stage 1 throttle up” then abort just after that.. reminded me of the “go for throttle up”.. some of you may know what I’m taking about.. I’m glad these guys will have an abort system available and testing in flight like this was awesome.. good job spaceX
- nrb 7y agoFor anyone unfamiliar: "go at throttle up" was the final communication to/from Space Shuttle Challenger during launch of mission STS-51-L moments before it tragically exploded, resulting in the loss of all crew. The Space Shuttle did not have a launch abort system. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDnABgxUeV4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDnABgxUeV4
- JshWright 7y agoJust a little more detail, the "throttle up" had nothing to do with the anomaly, it just happened at that stage in flight.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- LeoPanthera 7y ago> The Space Shuttle did not have a launch abort system. Challenger did not. Later shuttle launches included the "Inflight Crew Escape System", or ICES. https://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/shutref/escape/inflight.html https://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/shutref/escap...
- Teknoman117 7y agoICES was not a launch abort system. It was a way for the astronauts to bail out of the shuttle after re-entry if they weren’t going to be able to land the shuttle safely. The only shuttle to ever was anything resembling a launch abort system were the first few flights of Columbia. It had ejection seats for the pilot and commander. However, later statements by NASA and the astronauts said that using them probably would’ve resulted in the death of the astronauts due to descending through the extremely hot exhaust of the launch.
- remote_phone 7y agoI watched the Chris Hadfield Masterclass on being an astronaut. It is wonderful and he is a fantastic speaker and lecturer. He talked about the actual launch, how nothing is left for chance, and how every second is accounted for. The astronauts need to fight the effects of the incredible acceleration and have a plan for literally every second until they reach space on 7-8 mins. The MasterClass itself is great, totally worth it and Chris Hadfield is a delight.
- hi41 7y agoMy jaw drops every time I hear about SpaceX and Tesla. How could Elon grasp two extremely different and difficult technologies and build such amazing companies within a decade. I have difficulty learning new things. Some pointers will help. Thank you.
- sfblah 7y agoYou, my good sir, are a fanboi’s fanboy.
- toomuchtodo 7y agoIt amazes me how this forum handles praise for determination, passion, and perseverance. We shouldn’t discount luck, but you can respect the traits above without the derogatory terms (“fan boi”).
- whateveracct 7y agoIdolization of others is unbecoming period. No person is special or mystically above others for doing acts of business and technology. That's what I live by at least.
- endorphone 7y agoAdmiring the accomplishments of others is unbecoming? That is remarkably sad. As the root post says, it is amazing what Musk has achieved, and I'd love to learn what the secret is. I suspect it's that he knows the limits of his own capabilities so he finds the right people to execute his visions. But it is absolutely remarkable that a payment startup guy kicked off two envelope-pushing companies that have achieved such heights. Countless rich guys have taken their lucre and tried to change the world, usually to extraordinary failure. Tesla and SpaceX have both changed the world and entire industries (as did PayPal), and they're just getting started.
- whateveracct 7y ago
- rohan1024 7y agoThat was great! The guys said at the beginning that they are expecting Falcon to blow up because aerodynamics change significantly once the nose separates. Stupid question, couldn't they just give Falcon it's own nose so that it doesn't blow up after dragon separates? Dragon could have been mounted on that nose.
- Ndymium 7y agoI would imagine the escape system is only used when there is something very wrong with the flight. In that case there is usually no hope of recovering the rocket anyway (if it didn't explode, could it make it to the landing site?). The added weight and complexity probably make this a bad trade-off.
- skykooler 7y agoI remember seeing someone tackle that question on /r/spacex; the consensus was that, while a first stage booster can return on its own, if it has a full second stage attached the extra mass is too much for the legs (it normally lands nearly empty) and the extra length causes aerodynamics issues (the gridfins should be at the top of the rocket but in that scenario there's quite a bit of rocket above them).
- nrb 7y agoIn the event an in-flight abort becomes necessary, odds are that the craft is probably going to be lost no matter what. Adding additional complexity or weight for a vanishingly unlikely scenario likely isn't worth it to them.
- LeonM 7y ago> Stupid question, couldn't they just give Falcon it's own nose so that it doesn't blow up after dragon separates? Dragon could have been mounted on that nose. There are no stupid questions. The abort system is only there as a last resort in case of booster failure. So in a situation where the abort system is fired, the falcon has probably already failed beyond the point where it is expected to be able to land.
- 7y ago
- _Microft 7y agoPhotos are coming in on Twitter. Thanks to all photographers for the amazing pictures! If you're a photographer and don't want your photos to be linked to from here, please say so. Official (SpaceX) close-up video of the separation event / IFA: https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1218976479150858241 https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1218976479150858241 Great shots of the fireball: https://twitter.com/GregScott_photo/status/1218951440691073026/photo/2 https://twitter.com/GregScott_photo/status/12189514406910730... https://twitter.com/BrandonHSlam/status/1218923590260645889 https://twitter.com/BrandonHSlam/status/1218923590260645889 https://twitter.com/Mimikry_/status/1218937739590230016 https://twitter.com/Mimikry_/status/1218937739590230016 https://twitter.com/_flsportsguy/status/1218930068887613441 https://twitter.com/_flsportsguy/status/1218930068887613441 https://twitter.com/thelanjampod/status/1218949597231489024 https://twitter.com/thelanjampod/status/1218949597231489024 (multiple frames) Falling booster or second stage (the ratio of black to white hull area is the same on both stages, so I can not tell which one of both it is): https://twitter.com/mike_deep/status/1218926880381902849/photo/3 https://twitter.com/mike_deep/status/1218926880381902849/pho... Impact of said part on the surface of the sea: https://twitter.com/johnpisaniphoto/status/1218946166638940160/photo/2 https://twitter.com/johnpisaniphoto/status/12189461666389401... Infrared images: https://twitter.com/turndownformars/status/1218925720736600066 https://twitter.com/turndownformars/status/12189257207366000... https://twitter.com/turndownformars/status/1218941599608078336 https://twitter.com/turndownformars/status/12189415996080783... In-flight abort test appearing on the weather radar: https://twitter.com/NWSSpaceflight/status/1218924353997475842 https://twitter.com/NWSSpaceflight/status/121892435399747584... https://twitter.com/wxmeddler/status/1218925147861790720 https://twitter.com/wxmeddler/status/1218925147861790720 (animation) Lift-off and others: https://twitter.com/TrevorMahlmann/status/1218964067559387136/photo/1 https://twitter.com/TrevorMahlmann/status/121896406755938713... https://twitter.com/RDAnglePhoto/status/1218968896885215235 https://twitter.com/RDAnglePhoto/status/1218968896885215235 (viewing angle and height suggests it was taken from the roof of the VAB (vertical assembly building)) Splash-down of the capsule: https://twitter.com/FutureJurvetson/status/1218976684134715392/photo/1 https://twitter.com/FutureJurvetson/status/12189766841347153... (strange that Mr. Innsprucker called the parachutes white-orange. That looks rather like red?)
- notatoad 7y ago
- growlist 7y agoBeing able to watch regular (SpaceX) rocket launches live - including deployment of satellites in orbit and landing of boosters - free, for entertainment purposes, is in my opinion one of the most amazing things going at present. As a demonstration of how far technology has progressed to make this all possible it blows my mind.
- chrisco255 7y agoYeah it's a good point, network television limited the amount of airtime things like this could get in prior decades.
- sandworm101 7y ago>> - free, for entertainment purposes, is in my opinion one of the most amazing things going at present. Except that it isn't. All that classic NASA space footage was shared because it was copyright-free. As products of the US federal government they were not subject to copyright protection. They were transmitted and used everywhere. When "The Six Million Dollar Man" or "Buck Rogers" wanted to use NASA launch footage (or USAF crash footage) they just did. No questions asked. SpaceX footage isn't from the US fed. It is private and therefore protected copyright. It cannot be used anywhere anytime. We all must ask SpaceX for permission. Use it in a manner that SpaceX disagrees with and you can expect lawyers. You wont see the failure footage from SpaceX ever used as nasa footage was used by countless scifi productions. So no, this is no amazing thing. While modern footage is a visual feast, in terms of freedom it is a step down from what we once had. I think those running TV news networks (or youtube, or any other distribution network) would rather return to the old system whereby they could use footage however they liked. We won't ever see SpaceX crash footage used for much of anything. What I am talking about. Six Million Dollar Man opening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGO57y4td-c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGO57y4td-c Original NASA footage: (Crash at about 2:00) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50dDWT48b9M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50dDWT48b9M
- optimiz3 7y ago> But SpaceX footage isn't from the US fed. It is subject to copyright. It cannot be used anywhere anytime. We all must ask SpaceX for permission. Use it in a manner that SpaceX disagrees with and you can expect lawyers. So much pessimism. I think it's great a private for profit corporation is doing as much as it is given it has no obligation to do so.
- milansuk 7y agoI hope, this is the last time when we see the abort/escape system activated. Good luck and godspeed, Spacex!
- shmerl 7y agoGreat result. One thing stood out, in the commentary they sometimes used feet and sometimes meters. Better just to stick to metric to avoid the mess. Reminds me various stories, when mix up between metric and imperial made space missions fail. So SpaceX teams should have stronger focus on avoiding this.
- JshWright 7y agoI think you're confusing the public broadcast commentary with the engineering that goes into the actual hardware. There are slightly different levels of rigor involved... (and very different audiences)
- shmerl 7y agoI think it should be uniform, until it becomes a habit. Making it lax in one area can backfire in another. That's besides the point that someone should be advancing the usage of metric for the general public, and who is best suited for it, if not someone already invested in it like SpaceX. Their HUD in the video is already using metric for example.
- JshWright 7y agoBear in mind that the audience of the webcast is not uniformly comfortable with metric units. Using both makes sure that everyone has a sense of the scales involved. By using them both, it's a good way to give someone who doesn't use metric a basic understanding of the conversions.
- shmerl 7y agoThat's the point. In order to make the public comfortable, metric should be used for them. That's the only way to gain comfort. Not using it only prolongs the issue. The government basically gave up on it, leaving metrication in shambles. So SpaceX is in good position to do something about it. And using one or another intermittently only adds confusion IMHO, unless you literally use both for each value which is even more annoying (at least to me).
- chasd00 7y agois it just me or was the water deludge system late at liftoff?
- thisisastopsign 7y agoCongrats SpaceX team! I hope they post the view from the Crew Dragon vehicle of the Falcon 9 breaking up. That seems to be the one view that was missed (in addition to splashdown from the aircraft angle)
- saberdancer 7y agoWas there mention of why they did not do a launch escape while the F5 was at full throttle? I understand this reduces the risk and was probably deemed to be good enough of a test, but I was expecting the test to be "worst case scenario" or in other words, F5 on full power at MaxQ.
- Taniwha 7y agoI think that "F5 on full power at MaxQ" is not a worst case scenario, it's more like "flying nominally" - doing it at maxQ is certainly the thing to do - but "on FS flameout" is more realistic
- saberdancer 7y agoFS flameout may be more realistic, but you need to test for worst case scenarios. Having F5 throttle down allows any kind of Dragon acceleration to pull it away from the Falcon. The critical design element of an crew ejection system is that it needs to out-accelerate the rocket so testing while the Falcon remained at full power seems logical. They probably have reasons not to do it.
- gpm 7y agoThe Falcon 9 never goes through MaxQ at full throttle, throttling down before MaxQ and up after MaxQ is part of the normal flight path. This Falcon 9 followed the normal flight path right up to the point where the abort was artificially induced. I believe the abort did actually take place at full throttle though, it happened at the point of max drag which occurs shortly after Max Q, and is after the rocket has throttled back up. The intent was definitely to trigger the abort at the worst time during the normal flight path.
- foota 7y agoWouldn't it be good to test whether the abort works in the face of an unexpected flight path, which could potentially be more stressful? Although there's probably not much of a difference if they full throttled shortly after MaxQ and then aborted.
- ChuckMcM 7y agoThis was pretty impressive. It was super awesome that everything worked exactly as it should and it clears the way for SpaceX to launch people to the space station. What is more relevant for me, is that if NASA follows their own rules, it also means that SpaceX will beat Boeing to having a manned spacecraft capability. The "rules" in play here is that Boeing had a requirement of doing a successful unmanned flight. In government contracts this is known as a 'threshold requirement' meaning that it has to be done before the contract can be completed. Boeing also had a parachute deployment failure during their drop test. As NASA (and some members in Congress) have been emphasizing on how important safety is and relentlessly hammering SpaceX over their refueling techniques and their "history", if they do not want to be seen as hypocritical they should require Boeing to at least achieve a successful unmanned flight to the space station and they could piggy back the parachute deployment test on that flight (and get a twofer, both the parachute test and the end to end flight test.) Requiring that however, will cost Boeing money (they have to pay the expenses for the retest out of their pocket) and more importantly time (they need another launch vehicle from ULA and a launch window). Versus SpaceX which only needs the results of today's test audited and signed off before they can launch their test crew. So perhaps 60 days, 90 at the most before they are cleared to fly people. So I think it is highly likely that SpaceX gets people up into orbit first. And that is a pretty amazing milestone and it slaughters a couple of sacred cows in the aerospace industry. The most impressive one for me is that an aerospace company can be started from scratch and beat all established players in capability, cost, and launch cadence. It is both a huge endorsement of SpaceX's approach and a huge black eye for the existing players. Given that the existing companies actually want to survive it heralds some really exciting times ahead for space. The other thing is that a company has this capability at all. I was talking with some friends about how do you "value" that in the market? How does it affect the geopolitics of space? What happens when Bigelow aerospace or another "space industry" partner starts selling access to orbital facilities that aren't government owned and operated? As far as I'm concerned I wish this had started 40 years ago rather than a bit less than 20, but I'm glad I have had a chance to watch it unfold. Exciting times.
- mr_luc 7y ago> As far as I'm concerned I wish this had started 40 years ago rather than a bit less than 20 Absolutely agree. I bought an 8-pack of used Heinlein paperbacks the other day that I hadn't read since I was a wee lad, which included 'The Rolling Stones' -- a slim volume about a family that live in comfort on the moon, but who get the itch and buy a used spaceship and head off for more exciting parts of the Solar System. In a paragraph or two it explained gravity well maneuvers and other Kepler-ish things better than current YouTube subject matter experts. It also described, in a sentence or two, that the starships had 3-way voting computer systems, where 3 computers get the same sensor inputs and 2 of them can overrule the 3rd in the case one differs. To the author, these were basic things that would clearly exist, because of physics. Sure, it missed some marks -- underestimated the computer, for one; its heroes were still manually 'astrogating' and doing a lot of difficult math to plot their courses, when now we know they could have just played Kerbal Space program ;) -- though I thoroughly enjoyed seeing a reference to them handing their flight plans to a 'programmer' who filed them into a big computer system. Of course, it was imagining a world where we would found a moon base in the 1980's. But I appreciated the solidity of its underlying premise: that a robust human presence in space was inevitable, because the difficulties that space flight presents, especially once you climb out of Earth's gravity well, are just not that far out of reach. That spirit was alive and well when that book was published ... ... in June of 1952. It turns out that, given human nature, we needed a lot of advances in computing to overcome difficulties, some engineering but others that no one could have foreseen -- like the fact that radioactive rockets and the additional power they could bring to the table were effectively off-limits on earth for human and political reasons, or that geopolitical and business reasons would concentrate space investment in areas that could be considered inefficient if conquering Earth's gravity well is your aim. But they weren't off by that much. The physics that stared them in the face continue to stare us in the face, and declare: this is doable, folks. There's no reason humans can't live and work in space on a large scale. We need some vehicles built, but some of them are getting built right now ...
- hectorology 7y agoSaturday morning < Sunday morning
- redis_mlc 7y agoI know there's a lot of space fanbois here, but the ISS should be de-orbited ASAP to save money for real space science. There's no scientific reason for manned spaceflight at this time, and virtually no science is performed on the ISS. Go watch NASCAR if you want entertainment thrills.
- lqs469 7y agoIt's exciting, Space technology development and achievement has been taking place by a commercial company or organization step by step, It can be freer and have more possible than NASA days before. Live stream today, and maybe more can happen next time, it's cool, same as the astronautical tech itself.
- busymom0 7y agoThat was awesome! Good job SpaceX!
- pugworthy 7y agoIt's impressive how long they've been doing broadcasts like this. I have probably watched every one live, starting with the first (failed?) Falcon 1 ones that were shown.
- sidcool 7y agoIn the post test presentation, it was so endearing to watch the NASA Admin talk about Elon as a friend. Elon has earned so much of NASA's trust, it's phenomenal. But again, I am an Elon Fanboy.
- 2480382841 7y agohttps://www.mol.gov.sa/securessl/login.aspx https://www.mol.gov.sa/securessl/login.aspx
- astannard 7y agoSpaceX above and beyond with its successful voluntary in-flight abort test. I wonder if Boeing will be doing a similar test?
- foxyv 7y agoIt would be cool if this was how SpaceX decommissioned Falcon 9 boosters from now on. Testing different failure modes and making crew flight safer. Random tests of stuff like engines exploding and maybe an induced COPV failure mid flight. Especially since they don't plan on re-using Crew Dragon Capsules. Then again I don't blame them for not wanting to spend the $50-100M each on additional tests. But if I were NASA I would commission them since they are so cheap.