5 ms·

Elon keeps hinting about competing with airliners for trans-oceanic flights. My bet is that Starship is going to become the suborbital trans-oceanic machine tha

by bdamm 4y ago

Elon keeps hinting about competing with airliners for trans-oceanic flights. My bet is that Starship is going to become the suborbital trans-oceanic machine that shrinks the world in a way not seen since the airliner was invented.

deusum 4y ago
Everyone be nice to Grandma! She pulled 9Gs out of Khazakstan just so she could see you on Christmas day. And she has to cruise back in the Morning! Talk about rocket lag
semi-extrinsic 4y ago
If there is one thing we desperately need to avoid as a society, it's developing new technology that burns massive amounts of hydrocarbons to make rapid travel anywhere (somewhat) cheap and ubiquitous.
orbital-decay 4y ago
So, basically Concorde, but worse and more restricted. Needs a launch site remote enough to not drive everybody crazy with the noise (Shuttle launches could have been heard dozens of miles away), and a secure trajectory to not kill anybody on the ground if things go bad. Not even talking about reliability, g-loads, and many other things. You can't jump from Mayfair, London to Manhattan with this system, at which point any flight time improvement becomes negligible.
- adamsb6 4y ago
  High speed ferry to offshore platform? That should address both noise and safety. All the check-in gets handled on shore, then a fifteen minute ride out to the platform on a high speed ferry, 20 minutes to onboard, then 30 minutes to any other offshore platform in the world, followed by a 20 minute offboarding, and another fifteen minute ferry ride. The actual travel time would be less than the time you're expected to wait in the airport prior to boarding an international flight.
  - terafo 4y ago
    Are there any ferries that can hit 200 km/h? Because that's what it would take to get reasonably far from the city.
    - LargoLasskhyfv 4y ago
      Only half of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR.N4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR.N4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSC_Francisco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSC_Francisco Maybe a future revival of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground-effect_vehicle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground-effect_vehicle ? Or some shiny airtaxi vtol running on renewables, electricity, handwavium?
      - orbital-decay 4y ago
        Or just a hybrid HTHL vehicle, think SpaceShipTwo with an additional airbreathing engine and some thermal protection instead of a fancy feathered system (not feasible at high velocities). Take off on a quiet engine, get away from cities, make a rocket-powered suborbital jump, vomit in between, re-enter, land quietly across the pond. (still sounds handwavy and not very realistic, though)
        LargoLasskhyfv 4y ago
        That sounds like Reaction Engines Skylon / Lapcat A2.
mradek 4y ago
Why not aim for the moon? Honestly wish we'd invest in moving a lot of toxic manufacturing processes over to the moon (I'm sure way smarter people than me can figure out a way to make those processes work in that different environment) and slowly turn Earth back into a green, beautiful planet.

by bdamm 4y ago

deusum 4y ago

Everyone be nice to Grandma! She pulled 9Gs out of Khazakstan just so she could see you on Christmas day. And she has to cruise back in the Morning! Talk about rocket lag

semi-extrinsic 4y ago

If there is one thing we desperately need to avoid as a society, it's developing new technology that burns massive amounts of hydrocarbons to make rapid travel anywhere (somewhat) cheap and ubiquitous.

orbital-decay 4y ago

So, basically Concorde, but worse and more restricted. Needs a launch site remote enough to not drive everybody crazy with the noise (Shuttle launches could have been heard dozens of miles away), and a secure trajectory to not kill anybody on the ground if things go bad. Not even talking about reliability, g-loads, and many other things. You can't jump from Mayfair, London to Manhattan with this system, at which point any flight time improvement becomes negligible.

adamsb6 4y ago
High speed ferry to offshore platform? That should address both noise and safety. All the check-in gets handled on shore, then a fifteen minute ride out to the platform on a high speed ferry, 20 minutes to onboard, then 30 minutes to any other offshore platform in the world, followed by a 20 minute offboarding, and another fifteen minute ferry ride. The actual travel time would be less than the time you're expected to wait in the airport prior to boarding an international flight.
- terafo 4y ago
  Are there any ferries that can hit 200 km/h? Because that's what it would take to get reasonably far from the city.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 4y ago
    Only half of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR.N4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR.N4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSC_Francisco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSC_Francisco Maybe a future revival of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground-effect_vehicle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground-effect_vehicle ? Or some shiny airtaxi vtol running on renewables, electricity, handwavium?
    - orbital-decay 4y ago
      Or just a hybrid HTHL vehicle, think SpaceShipTwo with an additional airbreathing engine and some thermal protection instead of a fancy feathered system (not feasible at high velocities). Take off on a quiet engine, get away from cities, make a rocket-powered suborbital jump, vomit in between, re-enter, land quietly across the pond. (still sounds handwavy and not very realistic, though)
      - LargoLasskhyfv 4y ago
        That sounds like Reaction Engines Skylon / Lapcat A2.

mradek 4y ago

Why not aim for the moon? Honestly wish we'd invest in moving a lot of toxic manufacturing processes over to the moon (I'm sure way smarter people than me can figure out a way to make those processes work in that different environment) and slowly turn Earth back into a green, beautiful planet.