5 ms·

I've never been so nervous for a launch in my life.

by _joel 5y ago

Mountain_Skies 5y ago
I'm more nervous about the deployment. There are so many things that can go wrong after the launch but before it is fully operational.
- baggy_trough 5y ago
  I never thought the Mars rover sky crane would work, but it did!
  - _joel 5y ago
    I think most of the engineers on the project didn't either, what did Adam Steltzner, something like "It was the least worst option out of a lot of bad options". I'm sure there's a commentary there on modern life, but sod that, this far cooler than any addage :)
    - marvin 5y ago
      I saw an HN comment once, purporting to come from a NASA engineer that quit over disillusionment from being certain that the sky crane maneuver would never work.
- fortysixdegrees 5y ago
  Although I guess once it's in orbit, and major problems could be sorted out over the following years with manned repair missions, like they did with hubble
  - FourHand451 5y ago
    Not really, unfortunately. Webb will be much further from Earth than Hubble is, so as far as I'm aware a human mission to go repair it isn't really considered an option. https://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/webb-l2.html https://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/webb-l2.html
    - ravi-delia 5y ago
      If Starship delivers on its deltaV and economic promises, it's at least feasible, although that's a big if. Besides, if you can boost something the mass of the telescope with twice the volume and much less money, why would you bother fixing the one you have?
      - kabdib 5y ago
        You're better off with a plan along the lines of "launch a less-good-but-still-perfectly-fine new space telescope every couple of years" so that you eventually get good at it, and can afford to make mistakes. A few hundred million for each launch; heck, the long-term ground support is probably more expensive than the flights and the hardware after a while.
        a9h74j 5y ago
        About 10-15 years ago the European Space Agency was advertising that philosophy. IIRC they contrasted perfectionism (or zero risk) and slow learning against smaller experiments and faster learning. There was also some third term contrasted, perhaps that being that all-or-nothing huge projects demand a shift toward zero-risk and slow learning.
      - BbzzbB 5y ago
        They've worked on the design for over 20 years AFAICT. Even tho Starship will enable bigger and better telescopes, if there's a repairable problem and it is within reach, would be odd to just bail on JWST when the whole design/build process of the next gen will likely be a very long endeavor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope#His...
        ravi-delia 5y ago
        I think it's fair to say that with lower stakes you can definitely take less time on each telescope. The Webb is a miracle of engineering, but a lot of that miracle goes towards squeezing it into a pretty narrow fairing.
  - NobodyNada 5y ago
    > major problems could be sorted out over the following years with manned repair missions, like they did with hubble Not anytime soon. The Hubble is in low-earth orbit at an altitude of 540 Km, whereas JWST is at the Earth-Sun L2 point at an altitude range of 370 Mm to 1.5 Gm; further than the Moon. No spacecraft capable of carrying humans beyond LEO has been built since the Apollo missions. Starship and SLS will change the game, but both are still years away from manned flights.
    - retrac 5y ago
      Even then, it's quite possible a human mission beyond LEO to repair the JWST would end up costing more than just building a replacement telescope.
- _joel 5y ago
  178 things!
  - bumby 5y ago
    Ohh, you optimist :-) >"There are 344 single-point-of-failure items on average," Menzel said about the Webb mission, adding that "approximately 80% of those are associated with the deployment https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-deployment-points-of-failure https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-deployment-...
    - Ostrogodsky 5y ago
      step 138: npm run
      - _joel 5y ago
        Now it becomes clear why it takes 6 months to get to first light.
    - _joel 5y ago
      Well, thanks for making everything calm. 178 were the amount of individual actions in the deploy sequence but that number of SPoF makes it, just fine.
scrumbledober 5y ago
i was more nervous for Crew-2, the first manned spacex flight. If this doesn't work we've got SLS and starship coming down the pipe that should make more telescopes much cheaper and easier to build. If Crew-2 blew up it would have set spaceflight back much worse.
- _joel 5y ago
  Understandable that crewed missions are more risky, but by that point I think they'd had enough cargo loads and F9 flights on reused boosters that it seemed BAU. I don't think SLS will be in a position to be able to do this any time soon. Starship, well, let's hope so!

I've never been so nervous for a launch in my life.

by _joel 5y ago

I've never been so nervous for a launch in my life.

I'm more nervous about the deployment. There are so many things that can go wrong after the launch but before it is fully operational.

baggy_trough 5y ago
I never thought the Mars rover sky crane would work, but it did!
- _joel 5y ago
  I think most of the engineers on the project didn't either, what did Adam Steltzner, something like "It was the least worst option out of a lot of bad options". I'm sure there's a commentary there on modern life, but sod that, this far cooler than any addage :)
  - marvin 5y ago
    I saw an HN comment once, purporting to come from a NASA engineer that quit over disillusionment from being certain that the sky crane maneuver would never work.
fortysixdegrees 5y ago
Although I guess once it's in orbit, and major problems could be sorted out over the following years with manned repair missions, like they did with hubble
- FourHand451 5y ago
  Not really, unfortunately. Webb will be much further from Earth than Hubble is, so as far as I'm aware a human mission to go repair it isn't really considered an option. https://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/webb-l2.html https://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/webb-l2.html
  - ravi-delia 5y ago
    If Starship delivers on its deltaV and economic promises, it's at least feasible, although that's a big if. Besides, if you can boost something the mass of the telescope with twice the volume and much less money, why would you bother fixing the one you have?
    - kabdib 5y ago
      You're better off with a plan along the lines of "launch a less-good-but-still-perfectly-fine new space telescope every couple of years" so that you eventually get good at it, and can afford to make mistakes. A few hundred million for each launch; heck, the long-term ground support is probably more expensive than the flights and the hardware after a while.
      - a9h74j 5y ago
        About 10-15 years ago the European Space Agency was advertising that philosophy. IIRC they contrasted perfectionism (or zero risk) and slow learning against smaller experiments and faster learning. There was also some third term contrasted, perhaps that being that all-or-nothing huge projects demand a shift toward zero-risk and slow learning.
    - BbzzbB 5y ago
      They've worked on the design for over 20 years AFAICT. Even tho Starship will enable bigger and better telescopes, if there's a repairable problem and it is within reach, would be odd to just bail on JWST when the whole design/build process of the next gen will likely be a very long endeavor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope#His...
      - ravi-delia 5y ago
        I think it's fair to say that with lower stakes you can definitely take less time on each telescope. The Webb is a miracle of engineering, but a lot of that miracle goes towards squeezing it into a pretty narrow fairing.
- NobodyNada 5y ago
  > major problems could be sorted out over the following years with manned repair missions, like they did with hubble Not anytime soon. The Hubble is in low-earth orbit at an altitude of 540 Km, whereas JWST is at the Earth-Sun L2 point at an altitude range of 370 Mm to 1.5 Gm; further than the Moon. No spacecraft capable of carrying humans beyond LEO has been built since the Apollo missions. Starship and SLS will change the game, but both are still years away from manned flights.
  - retrac 5y ago
    Even then, it's quite possible a human mission beyond LEO to repair the JWST would end up costing more than just building a replacement telescope.
_joel 5y ago
178 things!
- bumby 5y ago
  Ohh, you optimist :-) >"There are 344 single-point-of-failure items on average," Menzel said about the Webb mission, adding that "approximately 80% of those are associated with the deployment https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-deployment-points-of-failure https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-deployment-...
  - Ostrogodsky 5y ago
    step 138: npm run
    - _joel 5y ago
      Now it becomes clear why it takes 6 months to get to first light.
  - _joel 5y ago
    Well, thanks for making everything calm. 178 were the amount of individual actions in the deploy sequence but that number of SPoF makes it, just fine.

scrumbledober 5y ago

i was more nervous for Crew-2, the first manned spacex flight. If this doesn't work we've got SLS and starship coming down the pipe that should make more telescopes much cheaper and easier to build. If Crew-2 blew up it would have set spaceflight back much worse.

_joel 5y ago
Understandable that crewed missions are more risky, but by that point I think they'd had enough cargo loads and F9 flights on reused boosters that it seemed BAU. I don't think SLS will be in a position to be able to do this any time soon. Starship, well, let's hope so!