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SpaceX will now let you book a rocket launch online starting at $1M
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- sorenn111 7y agoOne thing I love about Spacex is just how more accessible they make space feel. Between the livestreams of launches, the car in space, this, etc. Good on Spacex
- GaryNumanVevo 7y agoTheir HD live streams have been amazing. If we had any Saturn V rockets still around, I would pay to see a launch with all their cameras installed.
- Robotbeat 7y agoYou're in luck. SLS is the rocket being built by NASA (and contractors) and is the same class as Saturn V and will launch in a year or two. (SpaceX's Starship likely to do the same.)
- geerlingguy 7y agoHopefully they will build in the same level of remote cameras as SpaceX does. It's way more fascinating to watch a live view from the rocket, 2nd stage, etc. on SpaceX's streams than to see a 90s-era-quality 3D rendering of a 2nd stage in orbit with a few data points in Courier on the screen.
- Robotbeat 7y agoThe last decade of Shuttle launches had fantastic remote camera and ground tracking coverage (including 4K and views from the SRBs and external tank after separation), even better than SpaceX's. In part they did this because they were watching for potential foam strikes, etc, but it makes for a fantastic view. SLS is likely to have an even greater level of video documentation since technology will have progressed another decade and it will be such a high profile event (versus the regular Shuttle launches). I suspect many of these views will be live, too.
- Reedx 7y agoThey keep delivering inspirational "we're in the future" moments like no one else. I suspect it's going to start affecting the kind of things that some people will want to be working on. Hard to get excited about many of the (ad) tech companies after seeing 2 rockets simultaneously return back to Earth...
- dntbnmpls 7y agoThat's an excellent point. I think their ability to sidestep the media and interact directly with their fans and people via social media makes SpaceX feel more personable and accessible. There's no denying SpaceX has increased the enthusiasm for space related topics lately.
- AndrewBissell 7y agoAh yes, selling a vaporware product with no timeline for delivery to a crowd of adoring fans, definitely one of the hallmarks of a totally above-the-board enterprise.
- JshWright 7y agoI'm not sure you know what 'vaporware' means. SpaceX has successfully completed 81 launches to space, including many smallsat payloads (which is what they're selling here).
- nickik 7y agoAnd they are operating the biggest rocket anybody has launched in like 30+ years.
- madaxe_again 7y agoWhat the blazes are you on about? SpaceX have had 81 successful falcon series launches.
- stetrain 7y agoSeems like pretty concrete timelines to me, and I don't think adoring fans are too interested in booking commercial satellite launches. https://www.spacex.com/smallsat https://www.spacex.com/smallsat
- jlv2 7y agoFalcon 9 rideshare launches are not vaporware.
- loceng 7y agoI'm curious what your thoughts or beliefs are regarding Tesla's position, condition?
- AndrewBissell 7y agoThe stock is finally now completely disconnected from the fundamentals of the company, so tbh I'd probably consider it too radioactive to touch on the long or short side, unless you are a very experienced and nimble trader and keep position sizes very small. Haven't really been keeping up with the company internals too much to comment, but Montana Skeptic is posting again and is probably a good place to look if you want to catch up. I did see he mentioned recently that Q1 will be a disaster but did not dig into his reasoning.
- paxys 7y agoJust think of the credit card points on that one.
- Invictus0 7y ago3x on travel!
- CarVac 7y agoIt'll use up all your miles though.
- gimmeThaBeet 7y agoI wonder if they take PayPal?
- zomg 7y agoFrom an accounting perspective, this is a strategic way to pump up your balance sheet. And I agree with @paxys, I'd love to get those credit card points too! :)
- AndrewBissell 7y agoHow does this pump up the balance sheet? SpaceX takes in $1 million in a rideshare deposit, and now has a corresponding and equal liability to provide the service (hopefully for $1mm or less in costs) at a future point in time. It helps the cash balance, sure.
- toomuchtodo 7y agoFalcon fleet sitting in the Cape warehouse is paid for. It's just opex for each launch at this point. They're optimizing for revenue traditionally ignored by launch service providers.
- AndrewBissell 7y agoThey're not amortizing the costs of the rockets over the launches? I thought that was the whole point of making them reusable in the first place.
- wolf550e 7y agoThe first launch of a Falcon9 pays for the rocket in full (manufacturing costs, not development costs).
- OJFord 7y agoIf you buy a laptop to build software on, you can pay for the laptop with what you earn in a year, but that doesn't stop you amortising the cost over three. (It just increases your year one profit at the expense of years two and three, making the books more consistent.)
- 7y ago
- gibolt 7y agoDo they charge more for a window seat? I'd imagine their extra luggage fee is out of this world.
- stetrain 7y agoRiding on the back of a commsat probably isn't very luxurious. You'll have a hell of a view though between the cargo fairing opening up and the point where you run out of oxygen.
- wolf550e 7y agoThe payload fairing has holes, it's not hermetically sealed. The air escapes as the rocket ascends. It's a windshield, not a pressure vessel. Falcon 9 reaches above breathable air seconds after launch.
- jandrese 7y ago200kg capacity so you could build a tiny space capsule with enough air to keep you alive for a few hours. Getting back to Earth alive is an exercise left up to the reader. You'll also have to fit yourself (and your spacecraft) into a 24"x24"x24" space so I suggest consulting with some contortionists and losing some weight. Do you really need legs?
- dmurray 7y agoSo how long before the first space stowaway? Maybe when launches become 100x or 1000x more common, one firm will have lax enough security that some teenager can sneak aboard in a homemade spaceship or spacesuit.
- YawningAngel 7y ago100kg to space is a _lot_ of fuel, I think they'd notice. I'd be shocked if weight isn't checked on the launch pad.
- yingw787 7y agoThis is soooo cool! I’m excited for them to keep lowering the cost of access to space. Maybe one day it will be a few thousand dollars, and I can buy a satellite to hack around with.
- anfractuosity 7y agoThis sounded interesting, on the topic of having your own little satellite (for a short time anyway, by the sounds of it) - https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/04/kicksat-2-project-launches-105-cracker-sized-satellites/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/04/kicksat-2-project-launches...
- dbcurtis 7y agoIn the mean time, you could learn your chops by volunteering to work on one of the Amateur Radio satellites.
- Rebelgecko 7y agoThe Ardusat/Spire guys were renting out a week of cubesat time for $250
- teruakohatu 7y agoI don't understand the economics of space launches but it has reported that Rocket Lab charges about $5.7 mil to launch a 150-225kg payload. SpaceX seems to be miles cheaper at $1 mil for a 200kg payload. How can rocket lab compete? More flexibility?
- JshWright 7y agoSpaceX is bundling more payloads together, so they get better economies of scale (plus the reuse thing).
- jcims 7y agoGiven that rocketlab is now tinkering with reuse, they may be able to bring those costs down even more.
- SEJeff 7y agoGiven that space is tinkering with Starship and Superheavy, they will be able to bring their costs massively down. It will just take them a few more years most likely. In reality, the cheaper access to space opens up so many more opportunities for new customers. When it is affordable for a college to send up some cubesats for research, they're going to do it.
- torpfactory 7y agoIf you get on a SpaceX ride share, you don't get to choose your own orbit. You'll have to make-do with an orbit that may (or may not) be close to your desired one. Unless you want your satellite to have propulsion, which might eat up any cost advantage. With Rocket Lab, you'll get the orbit you want typically, since you'll probably be the only vehicle on board. I suppose if SpaceX had an enormous manifest of small sats they could bin them into similar orbits, but that would really depend on just how successful they are.
- ThisIsTheWay 7y agoSlight clarification: SpaceX offers ride shares to distinct orbits, and customers can select what ride works best for their payload. Obviously if you're interested in an equatorial orbit, you're not going to select a launch from Vandenberg...
- transitivebs 7y agoSelf-serve rocket launches -- AMAZING
- Geee 7y agoAnyone has an idea for a satellite? What kind of satellite would be useful? I hope it becomes possible to connect any satellite directly to Starlink, so that it's easy to control / connect to them over the Internet.
- csours 7y agoI want one that goes PING!
- SEJeff 7y agoI want one that goes PONG!
- jcims 7y agoI think a LetsEncrypt style certificate authority that issues certs directly over lora/4g/WiFi would be cool. Hard to beat the physical security.
- benibela 7y agoA quantum satellite that sends you entangled photons
- no1youknowz 7y agoI know at the moment there is some controversy with the spacex satellites blocking astronomy viewing and I really hope there is a fix soon. But I would really like to see the day when governments aren't the only ones who build telescopes like the Hubble or James webb. That instead amateur enthusiasts crowdfund and build custom telescopes, launched on sub $250k rocket launches which then can allocate hours of control at a time at cost or at least give the telemetry for free. Imagine 25, 50, or 100 telescopes in space all looking out and mapping the night sky at ever increasing rates. Couple this with advanced ML techniques for anyone to go over the data. I'm sure a golden age for star gazing would just be beginning. According to [0], we have only discovered a small glass in comparison to a sea on earth. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwtC_4t2g5M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwtC_4t2g5M p.s If you haven't see The Age of A.I. on youtube, it's an amazing documentary consisting of 8 episodes.
- themagician 7y agoWhy? This is one thing that "governments" are really, really good at. NASA routinely launches things into space designed to last a few weeks that end up lasting for a decade or more because they are so amazingly overengineered. They don't do it for profit. They do it for science. Private business is almost always about short term gain (because it kind of has to be). I don't think I want a bunch of crowdfunded garbage just adding more crap to the skies hoping to turn a quick buck. We have enough crowdfunded garbage here on earth. The only crowdfunded thing I'd support at this point is filling a rocket with a bunch of e-scooters and shooting it into the sun. I know it's super trendy now more than ever to hate on the "government" but space exploration is one that that all governments—the US in particular—seem to do really, really well.
- ThisIsTheWay 7y agoThe cost and schedule overruns on JWST are a good argument against the statements you have made. The program is ~$4B over budget, and 3 years behind schedule. NASA does some things well, and is absolutely terrible at others.
- 7y ago
- jedberg 7y agoI couldn’t find the exact dimension limits, but it sounds like you could launch a bunch urns for $1M. Seems like a business opportunity for a funeral home.
- stetrain 7y agoYou're still going to have to fill out a bunch of FAA paperwork about your ability to provide control over your box full of urns and ensure it re-enters in a predictable fashion and timeline.
- yellowapple 7y agoOr just make sure it gets boosted into a graveyard orbit.
- skizm 7y agoDid you just learn this term from today's xkcd? Because I did.
- garaetjjte 7y agoCongratulations of being one of today's lucky 10000! Space burial was also discussed on xkcd, though not launching ashes but whole corpse: https://what-if.xkcd.com/134/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/134/
- SEJeff 7y agohttps://storage.googleapis.com/rideshare-static/Rideshare_Payload_Users_Guide.pdf https://storage.googleapis.com/rideshare-static/Rideshare_Pa... Here is the guide from SpaceX on the specific details. The biggest size for each smallsat is 24" x 24" x 24", but they also offer a smaller 15" size.
- jlmorton 7y agoAlready exists. SpaceX launched ~150 sets of cremated remains back in July, organized by a company called Celestis [1]. https://www.celestis.com/ https://www.celestis.com/
- simonswords82 7y agoThere's a ride share user guide that's got some incredibly interesting information: https://storage.googleapis.com/rideshare-static/Rideshare_Payload_Users_Guide.pdf https://storage.googleapis.com/rideshare-static/Rideshare_Pa...
- AndrewKemendo 7y agoI really want SpaceX to get into the end of life care market. I would much rather get on a one way rocket with big windows (that runs out of air after a few hours probably) than go to Hospice and die slowly over a few months or a year.
- dahfizz 7y agoA rocket launch is a very violent thing to experience. If you're months away from being dead, there's a good chance the G forces during launch would be too much for your body to deal with.
- AndrewKemendo 7y agoStill beats going out in a bed plus all the burial, cremation etc.
- Diggsey 7y agoThere's a lot of vibration, but the G forces are not that high, and they are particularly low during launch. The highest G force is right before the main engines cut off, once the rocket is already in space, at which point you presumably don't care anymore... For falcon 9 you don't even reach 2G until more than 60 seconds into the flight when the engines throttle back up after passing through max Q. Acceleration graph: https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-23ba4a3fe7f535430bed80f039d3e720 https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-23ba4a3fe7f535430bed80... (from https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-acceleration-of-a-Falcon-9 https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-acceleration-of-a-Falcon-9)
- livingmargot 7y agoThe passenger would feel one extra 'g' from gravity itself. Meaning it would reach a total of 4.5G, which is substantial.
- dandelany 7y agoNot without the ground pushing back against them, they wouldn't. Turn off the engines and the passengers feel weightless (because both vehicle and pax are accelerating earthward at 1G); therefore turn them back on @3.5G and they'll feel 3.5G, no?
- jaimex2 7y agoWell then, that's my funeral expenses sorted.
- ethagknight 7y agoTangential, but I've wondered about the opportunity for a company like Fedex to send freight on rockets between Fedex's major hubs, like Memphis to Guangzhou, so that you could get literal 'next day' service to the other side of the globe. Obviously very expensive, but also, at just $2,200/lb, there might be plenty of things that would be viable, like rushing an organ transplant or delivering an iPhone prototype, cutting out the 14-16 hour flight from Memphis to Guangzhou. Surely there are some scenarios where it starts to make sense, even at $10,000/lb
- dannyw 7y agoThere’s usually a fixed overhead cost to offering such a service, especially across large orgs. Think about training customer support staff to know about it, developing procedures on how to handle it, etc. So if it’s used 2 or 3 time’s a year, you might be looking at $2,200/lb plus $1 million divided by 2 or 3.
- darkmighty 7y agoPlus the last mile problem. If the journey to/from spaceports each side takes a few days, the hours of savings w.r.t. air travel won't matter.
- pkaye 7y ago> rushing an organ transplant I don't think currently organ transplants happen between countries. Even in the US the transplant centers are on a regional basis and any shift in regions to even things out becomes highly contentious.
- Rebelgecko 7y agoMost rockets don't launch on time edit: It will be interesting to see the results of the DARPA responsive launch competition though— https://www.darpalaunchchallenge.org/ https://www.darpalaunchchallenge.org/
- avmich 7y agoIf you launch a parcel from Japan in the morning of Wednesday on a rocket (a suborbital shipment), you may still deliver the package to US customer - say, Hawaii, or even San Francisco - before the end of the business day of Tuesday. The motto is "when the shipment is really needed to arrive yesterday". Hat tip to Michael Wallis, erps.org.
- swalsh 7y agoHow does a million dollar credit card transaction work? Is it still the $.27 + 3% deal? (or whatever it typically is now)
- savrajsingh 7y agoUnlikely the remainder is on a credit card. Probably a wire transfer.
- new_realist 7y agoOrbital launch customers don’t have trouble buying launches because they can’t find a phone. Ordering online smacks of desperation.
- oyebenny 7y agoWaiting for rappers to put their money where their mouth is and brag about doing this.
- lmilcin 7y agoNow, this is direct path to Kessler Syndrome. $1M is in a range I can imagine many people and companies will want to drop something just for bragging rights and it is very likely to go down in price in future. I think it should be recognized that safe space around Earth is a limited resource as every item added increases the chance of everything being effectively wiped in a short time.