7 ms·

SpaceX rolls Inspiration4 Falcon 9 rocket to the pad for historic launch

68 points by Pikkie 5y ago

soared 5y ago
As far as billionaires go, Isaacman is kind of well qualified: 2012, he co-founded Draken International, a Florida-based company that trains pilots for the United States Armed Forces. The company operates one of the world's largest fleets of privately-owned fighter jets. In 2004, Isaacman began taking flying lessons. In 2009, he set a world record for circumnavigating the globe.[6][8] He received a bachelor's degree in professional aeronautics from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in 2011. He is flight qualified in multiple military jet aircraft.[4] In his 20s, he flew in many airshows, but by his 30s, he had stopped flying much.
- madamelic 5y ago
  My sense of time is warped. When I read "2004", I thought "that's not that long ago" then I read "his 30s" and all sense of time went out the window. How could someone become a pilot in 2004, fly in airshows in 20s and stop being a pilot in his 30s and it only be "a few years ago"
  - labcomputer 5y ago
    You can solo a glider (with a student license) at 14. So one could be born as late as 1990 and become a pilot in 2004. Someone born as early as 1981 is still in their 30's today. "A few years ago" winds the clock back to 1978ish. So there's about a 12 year window that fit the constraints.
- retSava 5y ago
  Is that related to the (old) Swedish jet fighter Draken? It has a lovely design, quite iconic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_35_Draken https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_35_Draken
mabbo 5y ago
Interesting choice by SpaceX to use their booster B1062. One would presume that, given the profile of this launch, they will definitely pick the booster that they have the absolute most confidence in. And so they didn't choose a brand-new-from-the-factory booster. They picked B1062, which has flown twice already. It's not a real champ like 1051 which has flown 10 times and may have picked up some age-related defects. But it's also not likely to have any serious build flaws, since it's survived launch twice already without any problems. I imagine this is the same reason they pushed NASA so hard to let them use re-flown boosters for their human launches. A decade ago, it would be an insane thought, but using previously-flown hardware reduces the risk.
- mberning 5y ago
  It’s a very interesting approach but makes some sense. When it comes to failures the two big cohorts are “crib deaths” and “old age”. By picking something that flew twice they are able to pick a machine still early in its life cycle but survived adolescence.
  - lallysingh 5y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathtub_curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathtub_curve It's well understood.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- tomschlick 5y ago
  Yeah its kind of insane that we ever did it any other way. Its akin to buying a car that no human has ever driven outside of a test lab and taking it on a cross country road trip.
  - mabbo 5y ago
    Except that if the car breaks down, people maybe die.
  - 5y ago
avmich 5y ago
> Unlike the Shuttle, which was largely designed by politicians and committees and engineered retroactively It's like saying a service is designed by PMs and engineered retroactively :( . It's a bad choice of words.
- ragebol 5y ago
  Can anything be engineered retroactively? I mean: the thing flew and landed, so there was clearly some successful engineering going on, before launch. The requirements were heavily influenced by politics, that is for sure.
  - aero-glide2 5y ago
    Biggest problem was that since the astronaut office demanded it should always be manned, design changes were very conservative. No rapid iteration was possible.
  - Robotbeat 5y ago
    The usual way of describing Shuttle in this way (which I assuming they are paraphrasing here) is it was “zip code engineered,” meaning it was intentionally designed with contractors spread across the country so as to maximize its political support base.
- dkarp 5y ago
  > It's like saying a service is designed by PMs and engineered retroactively Which is a genuine problem on some teams right? The most effective teams I've worked on had engineering a part of the product design process from the beginning. On the worst teams we received a "fully specced" ticket and no engineer had ever seen it.
mulmen 5y ago
> Set to fly on a twice-flown Falcon 9 booster and in a once-flown Crew Dragon capsule, SpaceX’s first fully private astronaut launch will also be reaping the fruits of the company’s decade-long pursuit of reusability. Is this the first time a Crew Dragon has been re-used?
- ktpecot 5y ago
  The Crew-2 mission earlier this year reused the Demo-2 Dragon capsule

68 points by Pikkie 5y ago

As far as billionaires go, Isaacman is kind of well qualified: 2012, he co-founded Draken International, a Florida-based company that trains pilots for the United States Armed Forces. The company operates one of the world's largest fleets of privately-owned fighter jets. In 2004, Isaacman began taking flying lessons. In 2009, he set a world record for circumnavigating the globe.[6][8] He received a bachelor's degree in professional aeronautics from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in 2011. He is flight qualified in multiple military jet aircraft.[4] In his 20s, he flew in many airshows, but by his 30s, he had stopped flying much.

madamelic 5y ago
My sense of time is warped. When I read "2004", I thought "that's not that long ago" then I read "his 30s" and all sense of time went out the window. How could someone become a pilot in 2004, fly in airshows in 20s and stop being a pilot in his 30s and it only be "a few years ago"
- labcomputer 5y ago
  You can solo a glider (with a student license) at 14. So one could be born as late as 1990 and become a pilot in 2004. Someone born as early as 1981 is still in their 30's today. "A few years ago" winds the clock back to 1978ish. So there's about a 12 year window that fit the constraints.
retSava 5y ago
Is that related to the (old) Swedish jet fighter Draken? It has a lovely design, quite iconic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_35_Draken https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_35_Draken

mabbo 5y ago

Interesting choice by SpaceX to use their booster B1062. One would presume that, given the profile of this launch, they will definitely pick the booster that they have the absolute most confidence in. And so they didn't choose a brand-new-from-the-factory booster. They picked B1062, which has flown twice already. It's not a real champ like 1051 which has flown 10 times and may have picked up some age-related defects. But it's also not likely to have any serious build flaws, since it's survived launch twice already without any problems. I imagine this is the same reason they pushed NASA so hard to let them use re-flown boosters for their human launches. A decade ago, it would be an insane thought, but using previously-flown hardware reduces the risk.

mberning 5y ago
It’s a very interesting approach but makes some sense. When it comes to failures the two big cohorts are “crib deaths” and “old age”. By picking something that flew twice they are able to pick a machine still early in its life cycle but survived adolescence.
- lallysingh 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathtub_curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathtub_curve It's well understood.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
tomschlick 5y ago
Yeah its kind of insane that we ever did it any other way. Its akin to buying a car that no human has ever driven outside of a test lab and taking it on a cross country road trip.
- mabbo 5y ago
  Except that if the car breaks down, people maybe die.
- 5y ago

avmich 5y ago

> Unlike the Shuttle, which was largely designed by politicians and committees and engineered retroactively It's like saying a service is designed by PMs and engineered retroactively :( . It's a bad choice of words.

ragebol 5y ago
Can anything be engineered retroactively? I mean: the thing flew and landed, so there was clearly some successful engineering going on, before launch. The requirements were heavily influenced by politics, that is for sure.
- aero-glide2 5y ago
  Biggest problem was that since the astronaut office demanded it should always be manned, design changes were very conservative. No rapid iteration was possible.
- Robotbeat 5y ago
  The usual way of describing Shuttle in this way (which I assuming they are paraphrasing here) is it was “zip code engineered,” meaning it was intentionally designed with contractors spread across the country so as to maximize its political support base.
dkarp 5y ago
> It's like saying a service is designed by PMs and engineered retroactively Which is a genuine problem on some teams right? The most effective teams I've worked on had engineering a part of the product design process from the beginning. On the worst teams we received a "fully specced" ticket and no engineer had ever seen it.

mulmen 5y ago

> Set to fly on a twice-flown Falcon 9 booster and in a once-flown Crew Dragon capsule, SpaceX’s first fully private astronaut launch will also be reaping the fruits of the company’s decade-long pursuit of reusability. Is this the first time a Crew Dragon has been re-used?

ktpecot 5y ago
The Crew-2 mission earlier this year reused the Demo-2 Dragon capsule