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SpaceX update regarding Starship FAA flight approval

76 points by redox99 2y ago

ravedave5 2y ago
[flagged]
- ivewonyoung 2y ago
  > If I worked for the FAA I'd make sure to reopen this as often as possible Wouldn't that be a first amendment violation? Not that it stops people like you from doing it.
- elfbargpt 2y ago
  Why would you do that? Just out of vindictiveness?
- dylan604 2y ago
  as well as drag my feet by placing any and all other tasks in front of these. Maybe the FAA can raise funds by starting a Disney-esque line jumper program. How much money do you have? Send it to us to get to the front of the line. Very similar to the simplified IRS tax form.
- elmerfud 2y ago
  Allowing your personal crusade against a person to impact your regulatory duties as a government official should land you in jail. Because what you're doing in your regulatory oversight position should be regulatory oversight of the issue not trying to impend on someone's freedom of speech. Try and set your ego aside and just do your job. This kind of attitude you have right here where you think the FAA should punish somebody's opinions is what makes the phrase "drain the swamp so popular". Literally unelected bureaucrats should be doing their job and not trying to control the speech of others.
  - echelon 2y ago
    > Allowing your personal crusade against a person to impact your regulatory duties as a government official should land you in jail. Because what you're doing in your regulatory oversight position should be regulatory oversight of the issue not trying to impend on someone's freedom of speech. If you're just 5% slower at answering requests to people you dislike in favor of people you like, imagine how much this weighs down a person in aggregate across all actors and decision makers in the state space. This wouldn't even have to be a conscious bias here, it could be a completely subconscious preference.
    - elmerfud 2y ago
      I agree that there can be unconscious bias and how you execute things. This is something that should be relatively easy to control for. When performing at your duties the assignment should be handed out in an impartial fashion you have a stack first in first out. You can simply measure the time to completion and the deviation. This should give you a good enough metric to know to look if there is potentially a deeper issues happening. It could be reviews from SpaceX take longer because the technology is different or is rapidly changing or a host of other factors. Once you know the actual metrics is when you can start to examine if it's bias conscious or subconscious or just the nature of the request. The op was indicating an actual conscious bias that they indicated would cause them to institute delays which is where the real problem comes down to.
  - Teever 2y ago
    What if the scenario is the other way around? What if they've been cutting corners for SpaceX because they appreciate the work that they're doing but now they're not because they don't like the way Elon Musk is behaving towards their organization or others?
    - elmerfud 2y ago
      In my mind the same would apply. When you're in an unelected position meant to be exercising some sort of regulatory oversight you should do your job with neutrality toward the person who's requesting it.
  - ripjaygn 2y ago
    Biden held an EV summit in 2021 and didn't invite Tesla. He declared GM's Mary Barra as the pioneer of EVs when GM had only manufactured 28 EVs that quarter and Tesla sold hundreds of thousands that were all manufactured in the US. The WSJ recently reported that it was because the UAW donated heavily to his campaign.
    - elmerfud 2y ago
      I do see a bit of a difference between a summit organized by an elected official and bureaucrats in unelected positions exerting personal influence. At some level when we elect someone we elect them based upon how they will exercise their discretionary authority. The role of the president isn't simply to carry out process. There is discretion and how they execute the duties of their office and holding a summit as in your example is one of those things. The recourse here is that is an elected official and if the people are unhappy with how they're executing that discretionary duties they simply elect another person. When you're talking about a bureaucratic lifer at some agency who is supposed to implement regulations and regulatory oversight that Congress has enacted that's a completely different thing. What recourse do the people have if this non-elected bureaucrat is not acting in an impartial way when they execute their duties?
    - orwin 2y ago
      Wasn't it a UAW EV summit? Or was it an event organized by executive power? Because if it was organized by executive power, i find it baffling. If it was organized by the Union like i just read, and they invited Biden who accepted, i find it weird but quite normal, and the rest is just outrage bait and whining.
      - sickofparadox 2y ago
        The UAW is why Elon wasn't there, but the summit certainly was not organized (directly) by them.
      - ivewonyoung 2y ago
        It was an EV event organized by executive power, Tesla wasn't invited because a major political donor to the presidential campaign, the UAW, didn't want Tesla there. More details from the WSJ. https://archive.md/856RL https://archive.md/856RL
  - altcognito 2y ago
    > Allowing your personal crusade against a person to impact your regulatory duties as a government official should land you in jail. Considering the state goal of the Republican platform is “to rid itself of the woke mind virus” and to hire only conservative loyalists, I’m not sure how popular your idea would be.
- snoochyboochies 2y ago
  "Being a total jerk" is his 1st Amendment right.
  - perihelions 2y ago
    I don't know why this is an unpopular opinion. Whether you agree or disagree with, or despise, that person's political views, the concept that people can criticize the US government to their heart's content, and that the US government does not retaliate for that, is a bedrock principle. Access to federal government agencies is not contingent on voicing support of specific (incumbent) politicians, or ideologies.
    - 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago
      Show me evidence that it's retaliation for criticism.
      - perihelions 2y ago
        I'm narrowly responding to the comment preceding mine. ("Being a total jerk" is his 1st Amendment right")
- srackey 2y ago
  Whelp, considering the FAA seems to think the same as you…looks like we need to revise civil service protections and do to the federal agencies what was done to Twitter. Sorry folks!
pjkundert 2y ago
People incapable of doing (or even understanding) something, interfering with other people who can do it, with no consequences if they are found to be wrong (or biased) in their basis for objecting to the activity. Fundamentally, this is loathing and envy encoded into law.
- wolfram74 2y ago
  Yeah, spaceX is an aerospace company, what business do they have saying the environmental scientists have no idea what they're doing? It's trivial for them to complain and get them crucified in the court of public opinion because spaceX is almost immune from the law since the US military relies on them so heavily.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
“Starship and Super Heavy vehicles for Flight 5 have been ready to launch since the first week of August. The flight test will include our most ambitious objective yet: attempt to return the Super Heavy booster to the launch site and catch it in mid-air. … We recently received a launch license date estimate of late November from the FAA, the government agency responsible for licensing Starship flight tests. This is a more than two-month delay to the previously communicated date of mid-September. This delay was not based on a new safety concern, but instead driven by superfluous environmental analysis.”
- tedivm 2y ago
  > superfluous environmental analysis. Maybe they should have thought about that before building their launch site next to a wildlife refuge. Maybe they shouldn't have caused significant damage to that same reserve (requiring months of cleanup) when they ignored their own engineers and blew up their own launch pad. The fact that they repeatedly violated their permit isn't helping. The reality is SpaceX can't be trusted when it comes to compliance with rules, laws, and permits. They've proven this repeatedly (even when their own engineers point out better ways). Of course that means oversight agencies have to provide more oversight. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/spacex-launch-site-boca-chica-texas-60-minutes-plus/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/spacex-launch-site-boca-chica-t...
  - BobbyJo 2y ago
    Its almost funny how important environmentalism is to Musk when Tesla is the context, and how unimportant it is when SpaceX is the context. It's wild how his image has gone from forward thinking genius businessman to bipolar self-serving workaholic in less than four years.
  - bryanlarsen 2y ago
    Every US launch site is next to a de facto or a de jure wildlife refuge. > requiring months of cleanup no it didn't.
    - 2y ago
foobarqux 2y ago
As I noted in previous threads this is brazen lying: they are not dumping tap water into the ground they are dumping (boiling hot) water that has been processed by blasting it with rocket fuel, which their own third-party analysis contains contaminants that are not present in "tap water". By SpaceX's logic any factory would be able to dump toxic water into the ground as long as they sourced the input water from the city's drinking water distribution system. This is probably the most basic environmental and health and safety law, namely to prevent businesses from dumping toxins into the water; trying to frame this as government overreach and knick-knack regulations is seriously depraved and it would be banana-republic-esque if he actually succeeds in ignoring or removing these rules.
- sq_ 2y ago
  Given that Starship and Super Heavy are both methalox fueled, wouldn’t the combustion products in the exhaust be carbon dioxide and water?
  - verdverm 2y ago
    Combustion is imperfect and it is occurring over metal which will erode into the mix of air and water. Then there is also whatever chemicals and material are on the ground prior to launch activities that get washed away with the deluge system
    - FireBeyond 2y ago
      > Then there is also whatever chemicals and material are on the ground prior to launch activities that get washed away Washed away after first being superheated by that water.
      - verdverm 2y ago
        I would imagine most of the wash away is not close to the exhaust, but down slope, mainly consisting of construction, maintenance, and vehicle activities.
lupusreal 2y ago
I bet this wouldn't be happening if Elon Musk wasn't shitposting on twitter, and particularly, doing it in a way that pisses off liberals/progressives. On the plus side, every day the Biden administration delays SpaceX, IFT-5 becomes more likely to succeed, digging the pit of despair for EDS sufferers even deeper. Invest in salt futures.
- throwaway1492 2y ago
  Let him go build his rockets in Russia or China. If he wants to support anti democratic folks he’ll be right at home somewhere else. Musk and his troll farm can piss right off imo.
  - srackey 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      > then Starlink and Starship becomes Chinese The point is there is no world in which Musk survives under Putin or Xi. He’d get Prighozin’d or Jack Ma’d because he represents a threat to the sort of authoritarian power that prefers folks like him far away.
  - lupusreal 2y ago
    EDS
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > bet this wouldn't be happening if Elon Musk wasn't shitposting on twitter, and particularly, doing it in a way that pisses off liberals/progressives I mean, yes, though to imagine it’s just the left Elon has disappointed is naïve. Musk went from representing a paragon of American industry to something much less. Being a paragon is powerful, in part because it’s undefined. Being a partisan political agitator has its own power, but it’s much easier to constrain and counter because there’s a playbook for that. (Witness, for example, how Musk was given a singular free pass on his relationship with China, but now isn’t able to push back on either party’s China policy.)
malfist 2y ago
This press release seems very unprofessional. It's very negative and aggressive, both actively and passively. I'm a huge fan of SpaceX, but this press release just screams "Musk ordered us to post a screed"
- srackey 2y ago
  Can you believe when you get dicked around by unelected bureaucrats for political reasons people get upset? They should know to listen to their betters!
  - malfist 2y ago
    That isn't what I was saying at all. There are reasonable and professional ways to disagree, and this PR isn't one of them.
renewiltord 2y ago
The ecosystem that is business is so interesting. You have creatures like SpaceX that are watered by the government and grow into magnificent trees but the tree has parasites that want to extract some of the value for themselves. It's like fertilizing the soil and finding that not only your crops but also weeds grow stronger. Everyone wants their cut. Which is why for a certain sum of money, the desert iguana will turn out to not be a problem. Great stuff. I understand how much fun it must be to be an agriculturist.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  You think government policymakers get a portion of the revenue from government licenses or what does this mean? > Everyone wants their cut. Which is why for a certain sum of money, the desert iguana will turn out to not be a problem.
  - renewiltord 2y ago
    I think that people just have friends who like to take them on vacation - nothing untoward. Just nice friends who do nice things for them. Out of the kindness of their hearts.
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      And surely this belief is anchored on solid, relevant evidence?
      - renewiltord 2y ago
        Yes, my axiomatic belief in the goodness of man.
        llamaimperative 2y ago
        No no, I'm asking about your actual belief that regulators are typically corrupted by arrangements like the one you're sarcastically pointing to.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
jupp0r 2y ago
It's absurd how these licenses are not fast-tracked by the government. This is one of the greatest technological assets the US have over other nations. It boggles my mind how the US government is shooting itself in the foot here if you compare it against other national security projects run by the government itself.
- foobarqux 2y ago
  They have had years to apply for the permits, no fast tracking was necessary, they just didn't feel like doing it.
  - bryanlarsen 2y ago
    The first Environmental Impact Statement was completed in 2014.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > have had years to apply for the permits In the way they have time to apply for licenses for an eventual Mars landing, yes. The practical timer started with IFT-4.
    - foobarqux 2y ago
      What are you talking about? They knew or should have known they would need these permits for years. ESGHound pointed it out years ago. This isn't a surprise that was dropped on them. Every other launch facility somehow managed to do it without any significant problems.
      - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
        > knew or should have known they would need these permits for years Link to the ESGHound source?
        foobarqux 2y ago
pr337h4m 2y ago
What, if anything, prevents SpaceX from using offshore launch pads? What about launches from international waters?
- acover 2y ago
  Itar
- MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
  Probably nothing, but that would surely be quite the feat. Just getting the necessary people there would be difficult, let alone the supply chain and the structures. Even operations like SpaceX need some degree of efficiency.
- pavon 2y ago
  As a US company they are required to get launch permits from the US regardless of where they launch from. Mixing jurisdictions would likely make things harder, not easier.
- cwillu 2y ago
  This launch is intended to test the ability to land on the original launching tower, which is a core ability to the intended economics of starship; launching offshore would defeat much of the purpose of the launch.
- indoordin0saur 2y ago
  The FAA has control over them no matter where they are. They cannot escape.
dave333 2y ago
Musk's right wing shift and naked conservative bias do not serve Spacex well when the opposition is in power. Most commercial enterprises with operations that fall under federal control play both sides of the street.
- mensetmanusman 2y ago
  It does serve SpaceX well if it reveals the boulder-esque bureaucracy and change occurs. The current federal system gave us Boeing rates of progress. Thankfully they have shown us a new way.
- indoordin0saur 2y ago
  They were already biased against SpaceX because the government and the parasitical military contractors react violently against any competence that embarrasses them when people inevitably make the comparison. How do you think this makes NASA administrators or Boeing executives feel? The latter had a nice thing going before SpaceX came along, tens billions of dollars guaranteed from the government without having to work too hard.
MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
So the FAA approved two separate 60-day reviews. Do they always take the full 60 days or could a verdict come earlier? I agree with the poster's assessment that this is pretty stupid regardless.
- ivewonyoung 2y ago
  It's worse: > Furthermore, the mechanics of these types of consultations outline that any new questions raised during that time can reset the 60-day counter, over and over again. This single issue, which was already exhaustively analyzed, could indefinitely delay launch without addressing any plausible impact to the environment.
  - MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
    It's difficult for me to determine how far this deviates from the normal bureaucratic absurdity. Just because something "can" happen doesn't mean it will. They "can" shut down the whole operation if they want, right?
- gps_sama 2y ago
  It could come earlier. Usually does to some extent. But the FAA really does take much more time than they should.
  - diggan 2y ago
    > But the FAA really does take much more time than they should What does that mean? Don't they take the amount of time they need in order to ensure safety, so that's the perfect amount of time? Or are you saying they're purposefully dragging their feet behind them just to make it slower for no good reason?
    - MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
      > Don't they take the amount of time they need in order to ensure safety I think the perception is that they spend all their time calling the meeting to order, identifying participants, itemizing the agenda, breaking for lunch, slowly reading a checklist of procedures, reconvening after a formal proposal for investigation takes place, etc. etc., eventually followed by about 48 hours of actual review activities. The typical bureaucratic process.
exabrial 2y ago
Hilarious, we used to throw SRBs from the space shuttle in the ocean repeatedly. I do agree, there seems to be a ton of extra scrutiny on SpaceX for no apparent reason. We can only speculate and I'm sure HNers have a ton of theories.
- jandrese 2y ago
  Corporate culture of "move fast and break things" probably gets regulator's panties in a bunch. SpaceX is doing development the right way, planning for multiple failed launches and attempting to learn as much as possible from each one as it develops the final product. This sort of rapid prototyping is orders of magnitude cheaper than trying to perfectly engineer everything right from the start. Downside is increased risk of unintended consequences on the initial test launches.
  - GuB-42 2y ago
    > Downside is increased risk of unintended consequences on the initial test launches. And regulatory agencies are here to make sure these "unintended consequences" won't damage more than the company finances. Regulators don't care about rockets exploding, as long as the company can show that they have taken the necessary steps to make sure no one is hurt when it happens, it includes the environment. "Move fast and break things" is fine if your things break. It is not fine if my things break.
- seanhunter 2y ago
  People used to smoke on airplanes. Regulations (and the approach taken by regulators to enforcement) change over time.
  - inglor_cz 2y ago
    There is a Space Race 2.0 with China on, though. The democratic world shouldn't lose that race just because of unbridled bureaucracy.
    - 2y ago
ripjaygn 2y ago
I wonder if the idea was to delay it beyond the election in early November.
- allears 2y ago
  Hard to see what impact a Starship test would have on the election, for either candidate.
  - rich_sasha 2y ago
    Depends where it crashes
  - indoordin0saur 2y ago
    Musk's company accomplishing a heroic feat could improve public opinion of his political endorsements. I mean, I don't think this way, but it seems like the sort of thing a petty bureaucrat might fear.
woodruffw 2y ago
The comments on the linked Twitter thread are entirely one-dimensional, and more than a little conspiratorial on average. Is there a neutral news source for this?
- daghamm 2y ago
  That twitter thread is brigaded by a blue-mark army of Elon fans who seem confident this was done by Biden administration. Now something off topic: I wonder if blue checkmark ratio can be used to determine the political direction of a thread. Testing thia could be a fun data science weekend project.
perihelions 2y ago
[flagged]
- ravedave5 2y ago
  I bet Elon tweeting AI generated videos of the VPOTUS in soviet garb helped a ton here.
- sjm-lbm 2y ago
  I do think we need to make the US a place where builders can build, but I disagree with this justification pretty strongly. This isn't a public organization working for the public good, it's a private company doing R&D to create a spacecraft that they will own and control. We're also, at least in the legal sense, not at war.
  - perihelions 2y ago
    It's a defense contractor with a track record of delivering things to USGov no one else is capable of (Starlink/Starshield). They're not a public service—but they do work for the US.
  - erupt7893 2y ago
    SpaceX is private, however this whole Starship program has NASA (public organization) funding parts of Starship's development for lunar exploration, as part of the Artemis program
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - inglor_cz 2y ago
    Private companies can have strategic value, too. The capabilities of SpaceX is what puts the entire US on the top of the current space technology race. Imagine having to beg the Russians to get the two stranded astronauts back to Earth.
- grues-dinner 2y ago
trothamel 2y ago
SpaceX seems a bit salty about it, justifiably so: https://www.spacex.com/updates/#starships-fly https://www.spacex.com/updates/#starships-fly
- diggan 2y ago
  > Despite a small, but vocal, minority of detractors trying to game the regulatory system to obstruct and delay the development of Starship, SpaceX remains committed to the mission at hand. Is the "small but vocal minority" the FAA here? They seem to go on the offensive instead of trying to work with the very people who can possibly decide their fate, seems a bit short-sighted.
  - ripjaygn 2y ago
    It's the media they're talking about, like writing hit pieces without doing research about mercury pollution that was because of a misplaced decimal point and making a huge deal about a couple of bird nests.
  - erupt7893 2y ago
    The small vocal minority is the media, CNBC reported inaccurately about environmental issues, causing this FAA delay. More details here: https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823080774012481862 https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823080774012481862
    - FireBeyond 2y ago
      Are you claiming that the FAA delayed permitting on environmental issues because CNBC had an inaccurate article on them? Citation needed.
forgot-im-old 2y ago
[flagged]
- gps_sama 2y ago
  The archive link that references Shotwell is dead. What was that pointing to? The Heritage Foundation can say whatever they want about SpaceX-- just because they can say it, that doesn't mean that SpaceX as an entity is onboard with the position Project 2025 paints for them.
  - kidme5 2y ago
    Main points from the link: Trump has been pitching a reboot of Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative using Elon's Starlink. At least publically since his reelection campaign: "the United States will build a missile defense shield to intercept nuclear weapons" https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/donald-trump-plans-plant-flag-28516928 https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/donald-trump-pla... It's also in Project 2025 / Heritage Foundation docs. SpaceX was founded in 2002 with help of a CIA agent named Mike Griffin ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career ) who funneled them funding (lots of citations at end of https://archive.ph/D2zIG https://archive.ph/D2zIG ). Griffin worked for In-Q-Tel and also was the Deputy of Technology for the Strategic Defense Initiative, later started the Space Development Agency (SDA) which is to become Trump's SDI in 2025.
  - vatueil 2y ago
    There's a user on reddit with a bunch of alts that keeps spamming the conspiracy theory that SpaceX is a front by the military and intelligence agencies to funnel money into building a missile defense shield. They like to point to an AI chat with Twitter/X's Grok as proof. It's true that some people connected to SpaceX were also interested in missile defense, but that's hardly unusual given that we're talking about the intersection between defense and the aerospace industry. To the extent that SpaceX enables missile defense it's in the same way they enable any other space endeavor, as a natural consequence of lowering the cost of lifting payloads to orbit.
- 2y ago
nycdatasci 2y ago
The linked post mentions 60 months instead of days.
- Faaak 2y ago
  Read the image
Animats 2y ago
How large an area of ocean has to be cleared for the impact?
TheAceOfHearts 2y ago
I've wondered about the long-term implications for the Mars goal as Elon keeps burning bridges within politics. Not that he was treated well by the current White House with regard to electric vehicles, so it's understandable that he would be upset. But turning around and endorsing the other candidate all while going on the attack against the current administration probably isn't winning anyone over. Overall, I just don't understand why Elon has allowed the Twitter political brainrot to take hold. If he's playing strategically, then it's happening at a level which isn't legible to me. I really don't see how engaging so much in divisive political issues is going to help him advance his claimed primary goal of extending human life to Mars.
- theossuary 2y ago
  How has the current White House mistreated Elon's ventures? For Tesla, the tax credit is still there, they pushed for and adopted the Tesla charger as the North American standard; heck they even levied a 100% tax against Chinese EVs (and batteries, and solar panels). SpaceX is still getting tons of federal money, it just got a billion dollar contract to deorbit ISS at the end of its life. It seems like policy is really working in Elon's favor right now to me.
  - ivewonyoung 2y ago
    From the WSJ recently: > Then in August 2021, Biden organized an EV event, to be anchored by him signing an executive order with a target to make half of all new vehicles sold in 2030 zero-emissions vehicles. > “In the auto industry, Detroit’s leading the world in electric vehicles,” Biden said at a November 2021 event while promoting the new infrastructure bill. He then turned to GM’s Mary Barra and praised the CEO. “You electrified the entire automobile industry. I’m serious. You led, and it matters,” Biden said. > Tesla’s leaders, including Musk, were outraged. During the fourth quarter of 2021, when Biden made these remarks, Tesla delivered more than 115,000 EVs in the U.S. while GM produced just 26. ... > The reason: Biden officials didn’t want to anger the powerful United Auto Workers union, which leaned on the White House to keep its distance from Musk, according to people familiar with the matter. https://archive.md/856RL https://archive.md/856RL
sfink 2y ago
This sounds very much like an incomplete story. Knowing nothing else, I'd guess that SpaceX pissed off somebody or somebodies, and it doesn't make a lot of sense to evaluate how reasonable or unreasonable their reaction is without knowing what triggered it. It looks like somebody is using whatever tool they have at their disposal, and the question is why. It could be a result of repeated violations of regulatory action, and this is a smackdown to show that yes, the government can fuck you up if it wants to. But that's pure speculation on my part. Of course, Musk will try to make this look as bad as possible. If his handy tool Trump wins this fall, Musk will use this to motivate his "let's streamline government by creating a new government oversight committee!" plan, which is probably largely intended to cripple any regulatory oversight that could possibly get in his way.
NotGMan 2y ago
[flagged]
- dang 2y ago
  Could you please stop posting tedious flamebait and ideological battle comments? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. We've also asked you to stop in the past: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37182078 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37182078. You're probably already over the line at which we ban accounts for doing this, but I'm not going to ban you right now. We need you to fix this, though, so if you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful. (And no, we don't care what ideological side you're on. We care about not having tedious flamewars from any side.)
  - NotGMan 2y ago
    No, go ahead and ban me. This topic is about politicians being butt-hurt and shitting on a company that has the most potential for humanity's progress. What I've described is NOT flamebating: it's the reality of what is happening.
forgot-im-old 2y ago
[flagged]
- forgot-im-old 2y ago
  SpaceX was founded in 2002 with help of a CIA agent named Mike Griffin ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career ) who funneled them funding (lots of citations at end of https://archive.ph/D2zIG https://archive.ph/D2zIG ). Griffin worked for In-Q-Tel and also was the Deputy of Technology for the Strategic Defense Initiative, later started the Space Development Agency (SDA) which is to become Trump's SDI in 2025. It was never about Mars. Look into the Mars Society leadership, they were military / Strategic Defense Initiative people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career#:~:t https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career#:~:t... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Zubrin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Zubrin
  - mlindner 2y ago
    Oh lord this made up story again. Your entire posting history is about this. There's no basis in reality for any of it. You're even citing a grok post from an AI bot as proof. Griffin was not a CIA agent and was not founded with Griffin's support. Griffin was asked to join the company but he refused. Griffin had no part in getting any funding to SpaceX. Your link is him lying (backed up by zero other sources) to raise his own status and rewrite history in his own favor (he's been on the talk circuit extensively after leaving government). Mars Society is absolutely about Mars.
  - panick21_ 2y ago
    [flagged]
- ein0p 2y ago
  I’m a conservative (though not “republican”/neocon/neolib/uniparty) and I don’t even know what “project 2025” is. Nor do I know any supporters. As far as I can tell it’s just a smear device along the lines of “when did you stop beating your wife”, or fake “dossier”, or “Russian collusion”.
amluto 2y ago
> At times, these roadblocks have been driven by false and misleading reporting, built on bad-faith hysterics from online detractors or special interest groups who have presented poorly constructed science as fact. People reading this should remember that Flight 1 was preceded by hysterics from online detractors who predicted, correctly, that the launch would make a giant mess. The FAA ignored them and allowed the launch anyway. The Wikipedia article would like to remind us that it wasn’t a toxic mess, but it was still a mess. Given the lack of any acknowledgement of that incident in this PR piece, I’m a bit disinclined to fully trust it. And I can certainly see why regulators would like to give stakeholders 60 days to comment on what might go wrong, since SpaceX’s history of predicting what will go wrong with Starship launches is a bit tarnished.
- sirspacey 2y ago
  A bit tarnished with verified remediation is the regulatory framework we need to be aiming at precisely because a 60 day delay for a regulatory review process is an enormous cost on an operation of this scale.
  - 7e 2y ago
    Not at all. Elon wastes much more money on his "fuck around and find out" method of engineering^H^H^H accretion. A million monkeys could do it better and more cheaply.
    - mensetmanusman 2y ago
      R&D looks like wasted money, doesn’t it?
      - 7e 2y ago
        Real R&D is a treasure. That’s not what Elon does. That’s slinging slop.
        lupusreal 2y ago
jiggawatts 2y ago
From the outside looking in, the behaviour of the FAA looks corrupt. They’re being influenced by someone (Boeing?) to slow down SpaceX because they’re too hard to compete with fairly on a technological merit alone. Disagree? Okay, then explain why the FAA just sits there passively seemingly giggling to themselves every time SpaceX makes a typo? Any excuse to press the multi-month pause button is mercilessly exploited. If you think that the government is working with industry to achieve supremacy in space, is this what you would expect to see? Can you imagine if right after signing the CHIPS act the Whitehouse just stood by while some tiny agency just held up a many-billion-dollar fab construction that’s vital to national security!? Someone in power is out to get Elon Musk and/or SpaceX. They’re most likely a competitor or in the pocket of one. Everything I’ve seen in the news fits that theory. The opposite theory of “SpaceX is the world’s best space tech company but also crazy incompetent and deserving endless punishment from every agency” doesn’t hold water. If the agencies cared about the environment or the water or whatever they would be working with SpaceX instead of harming their progress in a way that appears entirely punitive. Hasn’t anyone here been held up by a paperwork troll in your work? Haven’t any of you had this conversation? Secops: “Firewall requests take two months to implement.” Me: “I’m a consultant and this is a one week project. I’m finishing up Friday.” Secops: “That’s your fault for not submitting the request ahead of time.” Me: “It’s Monday morning! I just got here. I haven’t even finished my coffee that I got at the airport on the way here.” Secops: “Your lack of planning is your own fault.” Me: “Auditors prohibit me from working on any projects until the official start date, which is today. My guess though is that the rules will be: x, y, and z.” Secops: “You need to use our form 832b and use the specific IP source and destination addresses.” Me: “Can I have a list of your subnets and their IP ranges?” Secops: “No, that’s a secret. For security!” — this is how a one week project blows out to six months.
- indoordin0saur 2y ago
  As a consultant I have experienced this exact scenario at a government contractor. My team sat in a hotel for a week because the security badges needed to go through some third agency before they could give them to us and we could be physically on the corporate campus.
7e 2y ago
Why must HN become a platform for unfiltered corporate propaganda? Brainwash somewhere else, please.
throwaway4220 2y ago
I listened to a podcast last year featuring a FAA employee saying that the best way to delay the FAA is to complain to congress, who will demand a review. Then they have to drop everything and work on the review for a month. This spacex release and complaint is justifiable but I wish they didn’t use such strong language it just raises the rhetoric against itself
avmich 2y ago
SpaceX works on the leading edge of today's aerospace capabilities, and it's reasonable to expect new problems during their work. So it could justifiably be terra incognita to regulating agencies, including environment protection organizations. Yet it's unprofessional if they are showing up and demand delays at the last moment. It's the work of government agencies to watch companies like SpaceX closely and coordinate with them way ahead of large events. Nobody's winning when the environment is ignored, or when the aspiring company has to stop and switch to something else while waiting for permissions for important actions in development. So far USA administrations demonstrated reasonable balance, hope they'll manage to improve the current situation.
georgeburdell 2y ago
It’s surprising to me that a company so important to the success of many American aspirations is getting sandbagged by environmental regulations. For a rocket whose outputs are carbon dioxide and water, no less. It’s hard to ignore the possibility that Democrats are purposely slow walking SpaceX approvals due to Elon’s politics.
somethoughts 2y ago
I think it's part of the uniqueness of the United States that different states can try different experiments. If states like Texas and Florida governance want to run fast and are ok with potentially breaking things environmentally by easing regulation - we should let them. Perhaps they are right that commercial/industrial interests should be prioritized over the state's local population if the United State's space ambitions are to be achieved. Perhaps there's plenty of available land so not much is really being sacrificed and if something really bad happens? Elon, the leadership and engineering teams can probably move (back) to California.
- codewiz 2y ago
  As long as the environmental consequences fall entirely within the state borders, states should be allowed to decide independently. However, when it comes to polluting rivers, sea and air, consequences of pollution are of often planet-wide. Thus, a global approach is required. That said, the sooner Starship achieves full reusability, the sooner we'll stop burning rocket stages into the atmosphere and letting the incombustible parts fall into the ocean.
0xbadc0de5 2y ago
No doubt the FAA is under enormous pressure from Boeing, Blue Origin and ULA to slow things down for SpaceX.

76 points by redox99 2y ago

ravedave5 2y ago

[flagged]

ivewonyoung 2y ago
> If I worked for the FAA I'd make sure to reopen this as often as possible Wouldn't that be a first amendment violation? Not that it stops people like you from doing it.
elfbargpt 2y ago
Why would you do that? Just out of vindictiveness?
dylan604 2y ago
as well as drag my feet by placing any and all other tasks in front of these. Maybe the FAA can raise funds by starting a Disney-esque line jumper program. How much money do you have? Send it to us to get to the front of the line. Very similar to the simplified IRS tax form.
elmerfud 2y ago
Allowing your personal crusade against a person to impact your regulatory duties as a government official should land you in jail. Because what you're doing in your regulatory oversight position should be regulatory oversight of the issue not trying to impend on someone's freedom of speech. Try and set your ego aside and just do your job. This kind of attitude you have right here where you think the FAA should punish somebody's opinions is what makes the phrase "drain the swamp so popular". Literally unelected bureaucrats should be doing their job and not trying to control the speech of others.
- echelon 2y ago
  > Allowing your personal crusade against a person to impact your regulatory duties as a government official should land you in jail. Because what you're doing in your regulatory oversight position should be regulatory oversight of the issue not trying to impend on someone's freedom of speech. If you're just 5% slower at answering requests to people you dislike in favor of people you like, imagine how much this weighs down a person in aggregate across all actors and decision makers in the state space. This wouldn't even have to be a conscious bias here, it could be a completely subconscious preference.
  - elmerfud 2y ago
    I agree that there can be unconscious bias and how you execute things. This is something that should be relatively easy to control for. When performing at your duties the assignment should be handed out in an impartial fashion you have a stack first in first out. You can simply measure the time to completion and the deviation. This should give you a good enough metric to know to look if there is potentially a deeper issues happening. It could be reviews from SpaceX take longer because the technology is different or is rapidly changing or a host of other factors. Once you know the actual metrics is when you can start to examine if it's bias conscious or subconscious or just the nature of the request. The op was indicating an actual conscious bias that they indicated would cause them to institute delays which is where the real problem comes down to.
- Teever 2y ago
  What if the scenario is the other way around? What if they've been cutting corners for SpaceX because they appreciate the work that they're doing but now they're not because they don't like the way Elon Musk is behaving towards their organization or others?
  - elmerfud 2y ago
    In my mind the same would apply. When you're in an unelected position meant to be exercising some sort of regulatory oversight you should do your job with neutrality toward the person who's requesting it.
- ripjaygn 2y ago
  Biden held an EV summit in 2021 and didn't invite Tesla. He declared GM's Mary Barra as the pioneer of EVs when GM had only manufactured 28 EVs that quarter and Tesla sold hundreds of thousands that were all manufactured in the US. The WSJ recently reported that it was because the UAW donated heavily to his campaign.
  - elmerfud 2y ago
    I do see a bit of a difference between a summit organized by an elected official and bureaucrats in unelected positions exerting personal influence. At some level when we elect someone we elect them based upon how they will exercise their discretionary authority. The role of the president isn't simply to carry out process. There is discretion and how they execute the duties of their office and holding a summit as in your example is one of those things. The recourse here is that is an elected official and if the people are unhappy with how they're executing that discretionary duties they simply elect another person. When you're talking about a bureaucratic lifer at some agency who is supposed to implement regulations and regulatory oversight that Congress has enacted that's a completely different thing. What recourse do the people have if this non-elected bureaucrat is not acting in an impartial way when they execute their duties?
  - orwin 2y ago
    Wasn't it a UAW EV summit? Or was it an event organized by executive power? Because if it was organized by executive power, i find it baffling. If it was organized by the Union like i just read, and they invited Biden who accepted, i find it weird but quite normal, and the rest is just outrage bait and whining.
    - sickofparadox 2y ago
      The UAW is why Elon wasn't there, but the summit certainly was not organized (directly) by them.
    - ivewonyoung 2y ago
      It was an EV event organized by executive power, Tesla wasn't invited because a major political donor to the presidential campaign, the UAW, didn't want Tesla there. More details from the WSJ. https://archive.md/856RL https://archive.md/856RL
- altcognito 2y ago
  > Allowing your personal crusade against a person to impact your regulatory duties as a government official should land you in jail. Considering the state goal of the Republican platform is “to rid itself of the woke mind virus” and to hire only conservative loyalists, I’m not sure how popular your idea would be.
snoochyboochies 2y ago
"Being a total jerk" is his 1st Amendment right.
- perihelions 2y ago
  I don't know why this is an unpopular opinion. Whether you agree or disagree with, or despise, that person's political views, the concept that people can criticize the US government to their heart's content, and that the US government does not retaliate for that, is a bedrock principle. Access to federal government agencies is not contingent on voicing support of specific (incumbent) politicians, or ideologies.
  - 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago
    Show me evidence that it's retaliation for criticism.
    - perihelions 2y ago
      I'm narrowly responding to the comment preceding mine. ("Being a total jerk" is his 1st Amendment right")
srackey 2y ago
Whelp, considering the FAA seems to think the same as you…looks like we need to revise civil service protections and do to the federal agencies what was done to Twitter. Sorry folks!

pjkundert 2y ago

People incapable of doing (or even understanding) something, interfering with other people who can do it, with no consequences if they are found to be wrong (or biased) in their basis for objecting to the activity. Fundamentally, this is loathing and envy encoded into law.

wolfram74 2y ago
Yeah, spaceX is an aerospace company, what business do they have saying the environmental scientists have no idea what they're doing? It's trivial for them to complain and get them crucified in the court of public opinion because spaceX is almost immune from the law since the US military relies on them so heavily.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

“Starship and Super Heavy vehicles for Flight 5 have been ready to launch since the first week of August. The flight test will include our most ambitious objective yet: attempt to return the Super Heavy booster to the launch site and catch it in mid-air. … We recently received a launch license date estimate of late November from the FAA, the government agency responsible for licensing Starship flight tests. This is a more than two-month delay to the previously communicated date of mid-September. This delay was not based on a new safety concern, but instead driven by superfluous environmental analysis.”

tedivm 2y ago
> superfluous environmental analysis. Maybe they should have thought about that before building their launch site next to a wildlife refuge. Maybe they shouldn't have caused significant damage to that same reserve (requiring months of cleanup) when they ignored their own engineers and blew up their own launch pad. The fact that they repeatedly violated their permit isn't helping. The reality is SpaceX can't be trusted when it comes to compliance with rules, laws, and permits. They've proven this repeatedly (even when their own engineers point out better ways). Of course that means oversight agencies have to provide more oversight. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/spacex-launch-site-boca-chica-texas-60-minutes-plus/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/spacex-launch-site-boca-chica-t...
- BobbyJo 2y ago
  Its almost funny how important environmentalism is to Musk when Tesla is the context, and how unimportant it is when SpaceX is the context. It's wild how his image has gone from forward thinking genius businessman to bipolar self-serving workaholic in less than four years.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago
  Every US launch site is next to a de facto or a de jure wildlife refuge. > requiring months of cleanup no it didn't.
  - 2y ago

foobarqux 2y ago

As I noted in previous threads this is brazen lying: they are not dumping tap water into the ground they are dumping (boiling hot) water that has been processed by blasting it with rocket fuel, which their own third-party analysis contains contaminants that are not present in "tap water". By SpaceX's logic any factory would be able to dump toxic water into the ground as long as they sourced the input water from the city's drinking water distribution system. This is probably the most basic environmental and health and safety law, namely to prevent businesses from dumping toxins into the water; trying to frame this as government overreach and knick-knack regulations is seriously depraved and it would be banana-republic-esque if he actually succeeds in ignoring or removing these rules.

sq_ 2y ago
Given that Starship and Super Heavy are both methalox fueled, wouldn’t the combustion products in the exhaust be carbon dioxide and water?
- verdverm 2y ago
  Combustion is imperfect and it is occurring over metal which will erode into the mix of air and water. Then there is also whatever chemicals and material are on the ground prior to launch activities that get washed away with the deluge system
  - FireBeyond 2y ago
    > Then there is also whatever chemicals and material are on the ground prior to launch activities that get washed away Washed away after first being superheated by that water.
    - verdverm 2y ago
      I would imagine most of the wash away is not close to the exhaust, but down slope, mainly consisting of construction, maintenance, and vehicle activities.

lupusreal 2y ago

I bet this wouldn't be happening if Elon Musk wasn't shitposting on twitter, and particularly, doing it in a way that pisses off liberals/progressives. On the plus side, every day the Biden administration delays SpaceX, IFT-5 becomes more likely to succeed, digging the pit of despair for EDS sufferers even deeper. Invest in salt futures.

throwaway1492 2y ago
Let him go build his rockets in Russia or China. If he wants to support anti democratic folks he’ll be right at home somewhere else. Musk and his troll farm can piss right off imo.
- srackey 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > then Starlink and Starship becomes Chinese The point is there is no world in which Musk survives under Putin or Xi. He’d get Prighozin’d or Jack Ma’d because he represents a threat to the sort of authoritarian power that prefers folks like him far away.
- lupusreal 2y ago
  EDS
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> bet this wouldn't be happening if Elon Musk wasn't shitposting on twitter, and particularly, doing it in a way that pisses off liberals/progressives I mean, yes, though to imagine it’s just the left Elon has disappointed is naïve. Musk went from representing a paragon of American industry to something much less. Being a paragon is powerful, in part because it’s undefined. Being a partisan political agitator has its own power, but it’s much easier to constrain and counter because there’s a playbook for that. (Witness, for example, how Musk was given a singular free pass on his relationship with China, but now isn’t able to push back on either party’s China policy.)

malfist 2y ago

This press release seems very unprofessional. It's very negative and aggressive, both actively and passively. I'm a huge fan of SpaceX, but this press release just screams "Musk ordered us to post a screed"

srackey 2y ago
Can you believe when you get dicked around by unelected bureaucrats for political reasons people get upset? They should know to listen to their betters!
- malfist 2y ago
  That isn't what I was saying at all. There are reasonable and professional ways to disagree, and this PR isn't one of them.

renewiltord 2y ago

The ecosystem that is business is so interesting. You have creatures like SpaceX that are watered by the government and grow into magnificent trees but the tree has parasites that want to extract some of the value for themselves. It's like fertilizing the soil and finding that not only your crops but also weeds grow stronger. Everyone wants their cut. Which is why for a certain sum of money, the desert iguana will turn out to not be a problem. Great stuff. I understand how much fun it must be to be an agriculturist.

llamaimperative 2y ago
You think government policymakers get a portion of the revenue from government licenses or what does this mean? > Everyone wants their cut. Which is why for a certain sum of money, the desert iguana will turn out to not be a problem.
- renewiltord 2y ago
  I think that people just have friends who like to take them on vacation - nothing untoward. Just nice friends who do nice things for them. Out of the kindness of their hearts.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    And surely this belief is anchored on solid, relevant evidence?
    - renewiltord 2y ago
      Yes, my axiomatic belief in the goodness of man.
      - llamaimperative 2y ago
        No no, I'm asking about your actual belief that regulators are typically corrupted by arrangements like the one you're sarcastically pointing to.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

jupp0r 2y ago

It's absurd how these licenses are not fast-tracked by the government. This is one of the greatest technological assets the US have over other nations. It boggles my mind how the US government is shooting itself in the foot here if you compare it against other national security projects run by the government itself.

foobarqux 2y ago
They have had years to apply for the permits, no fast tracking was necessary, they just didn't feel like doing it.
- bryanlarsen 2y ago
  The first Environmental Impact Statement was completed in 2014.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > have had years to apply for the permits In the way they have time to apply for licenses for an eventual Mars landing, yes. The practical timer started with IFT-4.
  - foobarqux 2y ago
    What are you talking about? They knew or should have known they would need these permits for years. ESGHound pointed it out years ago. This isn't a surprise that was dropped on them. Every other launch facility somehow managed to do it without any significant problems.
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      > knew or should have known they would need these permits for years Link to the ESGHound source?
      - foobarqux 2y ago

pr337h4m 2y ago

What, if anything, prevents SpaceX from using offshore launch pads? What about launches from international waters?

acover 2y ago
Itar
MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
Probably nothing, but that would surely be quite the feat. Just getting the necessary people there would be difficult, let alone the supply chain and the structures. Even operations like SpaceX need some degree of efficiency.
pavon 2y ago
As a US company they are required to get launch permits from the US regardless of where they launch from. Mixing jurisdictions would likely make things harder, not easier.
cwillu 2y ago
This launch is intended to test the ability to land on the original launching tower, which is a core ability to the intended economics of starship; launching offshore would defeat much of the purpose of the launch.
indoordin0saur 2y ago
The FAA has control over them no matter where they are. They cannot escape.

dave333 2y ago

Musk's right wing shift and naked conservative bias do not serve Spacex well when the opposition is in power. Most commercial enterprises with operations that fall under federal control play both sides of the street.

mensetmanusman 2y ago
It does serve SpaceX well if it reveals the boulder-esque bureaucracy and change occurs. The current federal system gave us Boeing rates of progress. Thankfully they have shown us a new way.
indoordin0saur 2y ago
They were already biased against SpaceX because the government and the parasitical military contractors react violently against any competence that embarrasses them when people inevitably make the comparison. How do you think this makes NASA administrators or Boeing executives feel? The latter had a nice thing going before SpaceX came along, tens billions of dollars guaranteed from the government without having to work too hard.

MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago

So the FAA approved two separate 60-day reviews. Do they always take the full 60 days or could a verdict come earlier? I agree with the poster's assessment that this is pretty stupid regardless.

ivewonyoung 2y ago
It's worse: > Furthermore, the mechanics of these types of consultations outline that any new questions raised during that time can reset the 60-day counter, over and over again. This single issue, which was already exhaustively analyzed, could indefinitely delay launch without addressing any plausible impact to the environment.
- MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
  It's difficult for me to determine how far this deviates from the normal bureaucratic absurdity. Just because something "can" happen doesn't mean it will. They "can" shut down the whole operation if they want, right?
gps_sama 2y ago
It could come earlier. Usually does to some extent. But the FAA really does take much more time than they should.
- diggan 2y ago
  > But the FAA really does take much more time than they should What does that mean? Don't they take the amount of time they need in order to ensure safety, so that's the perfect amount of time? Or are you saying they're purposefully dragging their feet behind them just to make it slower for no good reason?
  - MetaWhirledPeas 2y ago
    > Don't they take the amount of time they need in order to ensure safety I think the perception is that they spend all their time calling the meeting to order, identifying participants, itemizing the agenda, breaking for lunch, slowly reading a checklist of procedures, reconvening after a formal proposal for investigation takes place, etc. etc., eventually followed by about 48 hours of actual review activities. The typical bureaucratic process.

exabrial 2y ago

Hilarious, we used to throw SRBs from the space shuttle in the ocean repeatedly. I do agree, there seems to be a ton of extra scrutiny on SpaceX for no apparent reason. We can only speculate and I'm sure HNers have a ton of theories.

jandrese 2y ago
Corporate culture of "move fast and break things" probably gets regulator's panties in a bunch. SpaceX is doing development the right way, planning for multiple failed launches and attempting to learn as much as possible from each one as it develops the final product. This sort of rapid prototyping is orders of magnitude cheaper than trying to perfectly engineer everything right from the start. Downside is increased risk of unintended consequences on the initial test launches.
- GuB-42 2y ago
  > Downside is increased risk of unintended consequences on the initial test launches. And regulatory agencies are here to make sure these "unintended consequences" won't damage more than the company finances. Regulators don't care about rockets exploding, as long as the company can show that they have taken the necessary steps to make sure no one is hurt when it happens, it includes the environment. "Move fast and break things" is fine if your things break. It is not fine if my things break.
seanhunter 2y ago
People used to smoke on airplanes. Regulations (and the approach taken by regulators to enforcement) change over time.
- inglor_cz 2y ago
  There is a Space Race 2.0 with China on, though. The democratic world shouldn't lose that race just because of unbridled bureaucracy.
  - 2y ago

ripjaygn 2y ago

I wonder if the idea was to delay it beyond the election in early November.

allears 2y ago
Hard to see what impact a Starship test would have on the election, for either candidate.
- rich_sasha 2y ago
  Depends where it crashes
- indoordin0saur 2y ago
  Musk's company accomplishing a heroic feat could improve public opinion of his political endorsements. I mean, I don't think this way, but it seems like the sort of thing a petty bureaucrat might fear.

woodruffw 2y ago

The comments on the linked Twitter thread are entirely one-dimensional, and more than a little conspiratorial on average. Is there a neutral news source for this?

daghamm 2y ago
That twitter thread is brigaded by a blue-mark army of Elon fans who seem confident this was done by Biden administration. Now something off topic: I wonder if blue checkmark ratio can be used to determine the political direction of a thread. Testing thia could be a fun data science weekend project.

perihelions 2y ago

[flagged]

ravedave5 2y ago
I bet Elon tweeting AI generated videos of the VPOTUS in soviet garb helped a ton here.
sjm-lbm 2y ago
I do think we need to make the US a place where builders can build, but I disagree with this justification pretty strongly. This isn't a public organization working for the public good, it's a private company doing R&D to create a spacecraft that they will own and control. We're also, at least in the legal sense, not at war.
- perihelions 2y ago
  It's a defense contractor with a track record of delivering things to USGov no one else is capable of (Starlink/Starshield). They're not a public service—but they do work for the US.
- erupt7893 2y ago
  SpaceX is private, however this whole Starship program has NASA (public organization) funding parts of Starship's development for lunar exploration, as part of the Artemis program
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- inglor_cz 2y ago
  Private companies can have strategic value, too. The capabilities of SpaceX is what puts the entire US on the top of the current space technology race. Imagine having to beg the Russians to get the two stranded astronauts back to Earth.
grues-dinner 2y ago

trothamel 2y ago

SpaceX seems a bit salty about it, justifiably so: https://www.spacex.com/updates/#starships-fly https://www.spacex.com/updates/#starships-fly

diggan 2y ago
> Despite a small, but vocal, minority of detractors trying to game the regulatory system to obstruct and delay the development of Starship, SpaceX remains committed to the mission at hand. Is the "small but vocal minority" the FAA here? They seem to go on the offensive instead of trying to work with the very people who can possibly decide their fate, seems a bit short-sighted.
- ripjaygn 2y ago
  It's the media they're talking about, like writing hit pieces without doing research about mercury pollution that was because of a misplaced decimal point and making a huge deal about a couple of bird nests.
- erupt7893 2y ago
  The small vocal minority is the media, CNBC reported inaccurately about environmental issues, causing this FAA delay. More details here: https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823080774012481862 https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823080774012481862
  - FireBeyond 2y ago
    Are you claiming that the FAA delayed permitting on environmental issues because CNBC had an inaccurate article on them? Citation needed.

forgot-im-old 2y ago

[flagged]

gps_sama 2y ago
The archive link that references Shotwell is dead. What was that pointing to? The Heritage Foundation can say whatever they want about SpaceX-- just because they can say it, that doesn't mean that SpaceX as an entity is onboard with the position Project 2025 paints for them.
- kidme5 2y ago
  Main points from the link: Trump has been pitching a reboot of Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative using Elon's Starlink. At least publically since his reelection campaign: "the United States will build a missile defense shield to intercept nuclear weapons" https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/donald-trump-plans-plant-flag-28516928 https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/donald-trump-pla... It's also in Project 2025 / Heritage Foundation docs. SpaceX was founded in 2002 with help of a CIA agent named Mike Griffin ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career ) who funneled them funding (lots of citations at end of https://archive.ph/D2zIG https://archive.ph/D2zIG ). Griffin worked for In-Q-Tel and also was the Deputy of Technology for the Strategic Defense Initiative, later started the Space Development Agency (SDA) which is to become Trump's SDI in 2025.
- vatueil 2y ago
  There's a user on reddit with a bunch of alts that keeps spamming the conspiracy theory that SpaceX is a front by the military and intelligence agencies to funnel money into building a missile defense shield. They like to point to an AI chat with Twitter/X's Grok as proof. It's true that some people connected to SpaceX were also interested in missile defense, but that's hardly unusual given that we're talking about the intersection between defense and the aerospace industry. To the extent that SpaceX enables missile defense it's in the same way they enable any other space endeavor, as a natural consequence of lowering the cost of lifting payloads to orbit.
2y ago

nycdatasci 2y ago

The linked post mentions 60 months instead of days.

Faaak 2y ago
Read the image

Animats 2y ago

How large an area of ocean has to be cleared for the impact?

TheAceOfHearts 2y ago

I've wondered about the long-term implications for the Mars goal as Elon keeps burning bridges within politics. Not that he was treated well by the current White House with regard to electric vehicles, so it's understandable that he would be upset. But turning around and endorsing the other candidate all while going on the attack against the current administration probably isn't winning anyone over. Overall, I just don't understand why Elon has allowed the Twitter political brainrot to take hold. If he's playing strategically, then it's happening at a level which isn't legible to me. I really don't see how engaging so much in divisive political issues is going to help him advance his claimed primary goal of extending human life to Mars.

theossuary 2y ago
How has the current White House mistreated Elon's ventures? For Tesla, the tax credit is still there, they pushed for and adopted the Tesla charger as the North American standard; heck they even levied a 100% tax against Chinese EVs (and batteries, and solar panels). SpaceX is still getting tons of federal money, it just got a billion dollar contract to deorbit ISS at the end of its life. It seems like policy is really working in Elon's favor right now to me.
- ivewonyoung 2y ago
  From the WSJ recently: > Then in August 2021, Biden organized an EV event, to be anchored by him signing an executive order with a target to make half of all new vehicles sold in 2030 zero-emissions vehicles. > “In the auto industry, Detroit’s leading the world in electric vehicles,” Biden said at a November 2021 event while promoting the new infrastructure bill. He then turned to GM’s Mary Barra and praised the CEO. “You electrified the entire automobile industry. I’m serious. You led, and it matters,” Biden said. > Tesla’s leaders, including Musk, were outraged. During the fourth quarter of 2021, when Biden made these remarks, Tesla delivered more than 115,000 EVs in the U.S. while GM produced just 26. ... > The reason: Biden officials didn’t want to anger the powerful United Auto Workers union, which leaned on the White House to keep its distance from Musk, according to people familiar with the matter. https://archive.md/856RL https://archive.md/856RL

sfink 2y ago

This sounds very much like an incomplete story. Knowing nothing else, I'd guess that SpaceX pissed off somebody or somebodies, and it doesn't make a lot of sense to evaluate how reasonable or unreasonable their reaction is without knowing what triggered it. It looks like somebody is using whatever tool they have at their disposal, and the question is why. It could be a result of repeated violations of regulatory action, and this is a smackdown to show that yes, the government can fuck you up if it wants to. But that's pure speculation on my part. Of course, Musk will try to make this look as bad as possible. If his handy tool Trump wins this fall, Musk will use this to motivate his "let's streamline government by creating a new government oversight committee!" plan, which is probably largely intended to cripple any regulatory oversight that could possibly get in his way.

NotGMan 2y ago

[flagged]

dang 2y ago
Could you please stop posting tedious flamebait and ideological battle comments? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. We've also asked you to stop in the past: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37182078 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37182078. You're probably already over the line at which we ban accounts for doing this, but I'm not going to ban you right now. We need you to fix this, though, so if you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful. (And no, we don't care what ideological side you're on. We care about not having tedious flamewars from any side.)
- NotGMan 2y ago
  No, go ahead and ban me. This topic is about politicians being butt-hurt and shitting on a company that has the most potential for humanity's progress. What I've described is NOT flamebating: it's the reality of what is happening.

forgot-im-old 2y ago

[flagged]

forgot-im-old 2y ago
SpaceX was founded in 2002 with help of a CIA agent named Mike Griffin ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career ) who funneled them funding (lots of citations at end of https://archive.ph/D2zIG https://archive.ph/D2zIG ). Griffin worked for In-Q-Tel and also was the Deputy of Technology for the Strategic Defense Initiative, later started the Space Development Agency (SDA) which is to become Trump's SDI in 2025. It was never about Mars. Look into the Mars Society leadership, they were military / Strategic Defense Initiative people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career#:~:t https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Griffin#Career#:~:t... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Zubrin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Zubrin
- mlindner 2y ago
  Oh lord this made up story again. Your entire posting history is about this. There's no basis in reality for any of it. You're even citing a grok post from an AI bot as proof. Griffin was not a CIA agent and was not founded with Griffin's support. Griffin was asked to join the company but he refused. Griffin had no part in getting any funding to SpaceX. Your link is him lying (backed up by zero other sources) to raise his own status and rewrite history in his own favor (he's been on the talk circuit extensively after leaving government). Mars Society is absolutely about Mars.
- panick21_ 2y ago
  [flagged]
ein0p 2y ago
I’m a conservative (though not “republican”/neocon/neolib/uniparty) and I don’t even know what “project 2025” is. Nor do I know any supporters. As far as I can tell it’s just a smear device along the lines of “when did you stop beating your wife”, or fake “dossier”, or “Russian collusion”.

amluto 2y ago

> At times, these roadblocks have been driven by false and misleading reporting, built on bad-faith hysterics from online detractors or special interest groups who have presented poorly constructed science as fact. People reading this should remember that Flight 1 was preceded by hysterics from online detractors who predicted, correctly, that the launch would make a giant mess. The FAA ignored them and allowed the launch anyway. The Wikipedia article would like to remind us that it wasn’t a toxic mess, but it was still a mess. Given the lack of any acknowledgement of that incident in this PR piece, I’m a bit disinclined to fully trust it. And I can certainly see why regulators would like to give stakeholders 60 days to comment on what might go wrong, since SpaceX’s history of predicting what will go wrong with Starship launches is a bit tarnished.

sirspacey 2y ago
A bit tarnished with verified remediation is the regulatory framework we need to be aiming at precisely because a 60 day delay for a regulatory review process is an enormous cost on an operation of this scale.
- 7e 2y ago
  Not at all. Elon wastes much more money on his "fuck around and find out" method of engineering^H^H^H accretion. A million monkeys could do it better and more cheaply.
  - mensetmanusman 2y ago
    R&D looks like wasted money, doesn’t it?
    - 7e 2y ago
      Real R&D is a treasure. That’s not what Elon does. That’s slinging slop.
      - lupusreal 2y ago

jiggawatts 2y ago

From the outside looking in, the behaviour of the FAA looks corrupt. They’re being influenced by someone (Boeing?) to slow down SpaceX because they’re too hard to compete with fairly on a technological merit alone. Disagree? Okay, then explain why the FAA just sits there passively seemingly giggling to themselves every time SpaceX makes a typo? Any excuse to press the multi-month pause button is mercilessly exploited. If you think that the government is working with industry to achieve supremacy in space, is this what you would expect to see? Can you imagine if right after signing the CHIPS act the Whitehouse just stood by while some tiny agency just held up a many-billion-dollar fab construction that’s vital to national security!? Someone in power is out to get Elon Musk and/or SpaceX. They’re most likely a competitor or in the pocket of one. Everything I’ve seen in the news fits that theory. The opposite theory of “SpaceX is the world’s best space tech company but also crazy incompetent and deserving endless punishment from every agency” doesn’t hold water. If the agencies cared about the environment or the water or whatever they would be working with SpaceX instead of harming their progress in a way that appears entirely punitive. Hasn’t anyone here been held up by a paperwork troll in your work? Haven’t any of you had this conversation? Secops: “Firewall requests take two months to implement.” Me: “I’m a consultant and this is a one week project. I’m finishing up Friday.” Secops: “That’s your fault for not submitting the request ahead of time.” Me: “It’s Monday morning! I just got here. I haven’t even finished my coffee that I got at the airport on the way here.” Secops: “Your lack of planning is your own fault.” Me: “Auditors prohibit me from working on any projects until the official start date, which is today. My guess though is that the rules will be: x, y, and z.” Secops: “You need to use our form 832b and use the specific IP source and destination addresses.” Me: “Can I have a list of your subnets and their IP ranges?” Secops: “No, that’s a secret. For security!” — this is how a one week project blows out to six months.

indoordin0saur 2y ago
As a consultant I have experienced this exact scenario at a government contractor. My team sat in a hotel for a week because the security badges needed to go through some third agency before they could give them to us and we could be physically on the corporate campus.

7e 2y ago

Why must HN become a platform for unfiltered corporate propaganda? Brainwash somewhere else, please.

throwaway4220 2y ago

I listened to a podcast last year featuring a FAA employee saying that the best way to delay the FAA is to complain to congress, who will demand a review. Then they have to drop everything and work on the review for a month. This spacex release and complaint is justifiable but I wish they didn’t use such strong language it just raises the rhetoric against itself

avmich 2y ago

SpaceX works on the leading edge of today's aerospace capabilities, and it's reasonable to expect new problems during their work. So it could justifiably be terra incognita to regulating agencies, including environment protection organizations. Yet it's unprofessional if they are showing up and demand delays at the last moment. It's the work of government agencies to watch companies like SpaceX closely and coordinate with them way ahead of large events. Nobody's winning when the environment is ignored, or when the aspiring company has to stop and switch to something else while waiting for permissions for important actions in development. So far USA administrations demonstrated reasonable balance, hope they'll manage to improve the current situation.

georgeburdell 2y ago

It’s surprising to me that a company so important to the success of many American aspirations is getting sandbagged by environmental regulations. For a rocket whose outputs are carbon dioxide and water, no less. It’s hard to ignore the possibility that Democrats are purposely slow walking SpaceX approvals due to Elon’s politics.

somethoughts 2y ago

I think it's part of the uniqueness of the United States that different states can try different experiments. If states like Texas and Florida governance want to run fast and are ok with potentially breaking things environmentally by easing regulation - we should let them. Perhaps they are right that commercial/industrial interests should be prioritized over the state's local population if the United State's space ambitions are to be achieved. Perhaps there's plenty of available land so not much is really being sacrificed and if something really bad happens? Elon, the leadership and engineering teams can probably move (back) to California.

codewiz 2y ago
As long as the environmental consequences fall entirely within the state borders, states should be allowed to decide independently. However, when it comes to polluting rivers, sea and air, consequences of pollution are of often planet-wide. Thus, a global approach is required. That said, the sooner Starship achieves full reusability, the sooner we'll stop burning rocket stages into the atmosphere and letting the incombustible parts fall into the ocean.

0xbadc0de5 2y ago

No doubt the FAA is under enormous pressure from Boeing, Blue Origin and ULA to slow things down for SpaceX.