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HN thread from 2015 for the last time SpaceX had a notable failure https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9793555 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9793555 I

HN thread from 2015 for the last time SpaceX had a notable failure https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9793555 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9793555 I think sometimes it's good to look back and learn from posterity

ryzvonusef 4y ago
On the topic, I think the Falcon Heavy launch has given us unrealistic perspective on the success of experimental launch vehicles. It went so flawlessly that most people online were pissed Elon didn't use it to launch some useful payload and considered his Roadster launch a vanity project, not realizing it could have gone Kaboom just like the Starship launch, and all Elon would have to show for it would have been the shreds of his roadster. When things go successfully, it's all Gwynne Shotwell and her team of Engineers to praise; when it goes south it's Elon and big mouth to blame for the all the issues. Maybe we need to realize it's all a test, that has Elon wanted, there would be NO press coverage and we wouldn't even have known a Test had happened, or that vehicle like Starship even existed. let's just enjoy the show, failures and all.
- AstralStorm 4y ago
  There's no way for SpaceX to hide a static fire from anyone, much less a launch. It's not a thing. This is not a stealth airplane. Even if unannounced nerds would fish it out.
  - ryzvonusef 4y ago
    True, but without Elon's say so, there wouldn't be 8K slomo and close up drone shots etc. We wouldn't even know it was called starship, or something like that existed. Anyone on the beach could have made a video of the rocket launch itself, but we wouldn't have been able to get the destroyed launch pad pictures etc. We definitely wouldn't have had any video of the insides of the Merlin rocket factory (i am not sure that without access to the spacex video feed and launch countdown, nerds would have been able to timely setup cameras to record something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mX5H_Gaicg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mX5H_Gaicg ) We have shockingly good access to information that no one else gives, imho.
- noelherrick 4y ago
  What SpaceX is doing is amazing, and it is a fun show. Reusable rockets are beginning to be as cool as the space shuttle was. However, it could very well be the case the Shotwell and the engineers are actively trying to prevent Musk from making bad calls while promoting good calls (I'm not saying this was a bad call). It's perfectly reasonable, if you have a company controlled by two actors, one of them bad and one of them good, to always praise the good actor when things go right and blame the bad actor when things go wrong (caveat: I am not calling Elon a bad actor, just saying that it's not hypocritical to always blame the bad actor and praise the good actor). But this leads to a bigger problem. SpaceX's attitude of experiment vs. drawn-out design is working (perhaps not too dissimilar to agile vs. waterfall design). Even with all that careful planning, the Space Race did kill people, we almost lost Apollo 13, and there were two distinct shuttle disasters that killed everyone on board. Even with very careful progress, we still had disasters. But, as I think this launch shows, SpaceX is going to experience similar events unless there's a incentives and structures to actually empower people with safety concerns (meaning the engineers and technicians on the ground). Both post-mortems on the shuttle disasters are filled with something like "a higher-up decided it wasn't that big of a deal and dismissed concerns because previous red flags turned out to be nothing." Single humans can be singularly stupid. Single humans that are busy running a company, incentivized by profit margins, isolated from on-the-ground operations, equipped with a golden parachute, and wealthier than god, are even more prone to detachment from reality. I also feel a bit bad for the astronauts that have to gamble whether these rockets are safe. Did this actually pass safety checks or is my life a sacrifice Elon Musk is willing to make? I suppose this has been part of the calculus of all astronauts since the post-Space Race era started to defund NASA, but it still sucks even if it's de rigueur at this point.
  - ryzvonusef 4y ago
    > I also feel a bit bad for the astronauts that have to gamble whether these rockets are safe. Did this actually pass safety checks or is my life a sacrifice Elon Musk is willing to make? isn't that an unfair assertion? Elon does not have the ability to rate his rockets "human safe", NASA did it. They make the final call, imho.
    - 4y ago

ryzvonusef 4y ago

On the topic, I think the Falcon Heavy launch has given us unrealistic perspective on the success of experimental launch vehicles. It went so flawlessly that most people online were pissed Elon didn't use it to launch some useful payload and considered his Roadster launch a vanity project, not realizing it could have gone Kaboom just like the Starship launch, and all Elon would have to show for it would have been the shreds of his roadster. When things go successfully, it's all Gwynne Shotwell and her team of Engineers to praise; when it goes south it's Elon and big mouth to blame for the all the issues. Maybe we need to realize it's all a test, that has Elon wanted, there would be NO press coverage and we wouldn't even have known a Test had happened, or that vehicle like Starship even existed. let's just enjoy the show, failures and all.

AstralStorm 4y ago
There's no way for SpaceX to hide a static fire from anyone, much less a launch. It's not a thing. This is not a stealth airplane. Even if unannounced nerds would fish it out.
- ryzvonusef 4y ago
  True, but without Elon's say so, there wouldn't be 8K slomo and close up drone shots etc. We wouldn't even know it was called starship, or something like that existed. Anyone on the beach could have made a video of the rocket launch itself, but we wouldn't have been able to get the destroyed launch pad pictures etc. We definitely wouldn't have had any video of the insides of the Merlin rocket factory (i am not sure that without access to the spacex video feed and launch countdown, nerds would have been able to timely setup cameras to record something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mX5H_Gaicg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mX5H_Gaicg ) We have shockingly good access to information that no one else gives, imho.
noelherrick 4y ago
What SpaceX is doing is amazing, and it is a fun show. Reusable rockets are beginning to be as cool as the space shuttle was. However, it could very well be the case the Shotwell and the engineers are actively trying to prevent Musk from making bad calls while promoting good calls (I'm not saying this was a bad call). It's perfectly reasonable, if you have a company controlled by two actors, one of them bad and one of them good, to always praise the good actor when things go right and blame the bad actor when things go wrong (caveat: I am not calling Elon a bad actor, just saying that it's not hypocritical to always blame the bad actor and praise the good actor). But this leads to a bigger problem. SpaceX's attitude of experiment vs. drawn-out design is working (perhaps not too dissimilar to agile vs. waterfall design). Even with all that careful planning, the Space Race did kill people, we almost lost Apollo 13, and there were two distinct shuttle disasters that killed everyone on board. Even with very careful progress, we still had disasters. But, as I think this launch shows, SpaceX is going to experience similar events unless there's a incentives and structures to actually empower people with safety concerns (meaning the engineers and technicians on the ground). Both post-mortems on the shuttle disasters are filled with something like "a higher-up decided it wasn't that big of a deal and dismissed concerns because previous red flags turned out to be nothing." Single humans can be singularly stupid. Single humans that are busy running a company, incentivized by profit margins, isolated from on-the-ground operations, equipped with a golden parachute, and wealthier than god, are even more prone to detachment from reality. I also feel a bit bad for the astronauts that have to gamble whether these rockets are safe. Did this actually pass safety checks or is my life a sacrifice Elon Musk is willing to make? I suppose this has been part of the calculus of all astronauts since the post-Space Race era started to defund NASA, but it still sucks even if it's de rigueur at this point.
- ryzvonusef 4y ago
  > I also feel a bit bad for the astronauts that have to gamble whether these rockets are safe. Did this actually pass safety checks or is my life a sacrifice Elon Musk is willing to make? isn't that an unfair assertion? Elon does not have the ability to rate his rockets "human safe", NASA did it. They make the final call, imho.
  - 4y ago