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> SpaceX eventually abandoned this project and sold the rigs, though Gwynne Shotwell, its president and COO, said in 2023 that sea-based launches were likely to

> SpaceX eventually abandoned this project and sold the rigs, though Gwynne Shotwell, its president and COO, said in 2023 that sea-based launches were likely to be part of the company’s future. SpaceX did not respond to a request for comment. Is anything known why they stopped pursuing the offshore space port idea? I assume SpaceX found some significant drawbacks that weren't obvious when they bought the oil rigs just a few years ago.

a12k 2y ago
Texas is just a much better and cheaper option. It retains the upsides of sea launches (being able to select location, being far from people) without the downsides (being out in the water vs landlocked). They can also take advantage of US infrastructure and legal stability, which are downsides noted in the article about equatorial locations, while retaining the upsides of those areas in the form of not needing to worry about pollution, and very malleable state laws. Basically Texas is as good as it gets if you’re amoral and running a company with large externalities.
- cubefox 2y ago
  I think Texas is currently used for testing purposes while the main Starship launch site will be in Kennedy Space Center, Florida. It's currently being built. Still, that's not a new fact, so there must have been a reason why they first thought offshore space ports were a valuable addition and then later changed their mind.
- jltsiren 2y ago
  One upside of sea launches is the ability to choose any heading, which makes reaching the desired orbit easier. When launching from land, you have a limited range of possible headings, unless you are willing to launch over populated areas. For example, rockets launched from Florida to ISS initially head northeast. A similar launch from Boca Chica would place the trajectory uncomfortably close to Houston.
pr337h4m 2y ago
For ships, stability seems to be the main problem: https://x.com/BrentM_SpaceX/status/1885450296421208118 https://x.com/BrentM_SpaceX/status/1885450296421208118 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1885508628582474040 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1885508628582474040 Not sure about oil rigs
- ghaff 2y ago
  Semi-submersibles--which is what Sea Launch was (former Ocean Odyssey)--are pretty stable. The marine risers (i.e. the big pipes that connect to the subsea blowout preventer) don't tolerate a lot of angle. Source: Used to work on, among other things, offshore drilling rig mooring analysis. But I can imagine all sorts of reasons why using an offshore platform introduces a bunch of challenges that launching from land doesn't have. Though of course, the ability to get away from people is a plus too.
  - hermitcrab 2y ago
    One of my wife's relatives was the master for the sea trials for one of the ships involved in Sea Launch. He had an incredible career, starting off as a brass helmet diver for the Royal Navy and ending up with Sea Launch.
- simne 2y ago
  That's why SL used most sophisticated rocket of time - Zenit, which was by definition extremely tolerant to platform instability (most other space rockets was not so tolerant).
mannykannot 2y ago
Despite Musk's whining about the FAA, SpaceX is not facing any difficulties getting its rockets launched from land, so there's no reason, at this point, to add something else with the potential to slow things down. It did not even want to build a proper launchpad at Boca Chica, which did not work out so well.
- pfdietz 2y ago
  It worked out fine. It's an example of iterative design where you find out the problems of an approach by doing the experiment, rather than by analysis, where you find out and have to address all the nonexistent imaginary problems too.
  - philipwhiuk 2y ago
    Except we'd already done a lot of experiments and you don't have to test it at full scale to realise it's gonna be chaos. Yes, there's some interesting papers post-fact on the ejecta but it was still dumb.
    - s1artibartfast 2y ago
      My understanding is that it was a matter of timeline. They simply did not want to wait and we're willing to trade off the consequences. SpaceX was already shipping a fabricated deluge system to Starbase 3 months before the first flight tore up the LaunchPad [1]. At the end of the day, the rocket did get off the pad. The repair was completed and the ready waiting deluge system installed in less than 3 months. This aspect is always lost in the bluster from Musk, and claims of incompetence from critics. https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starbase-starship-deluge-system-florida-shipment/ https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starbase-starship-deluge-sy...
      - philipwhiuk 2y ago
        The alternative view is they got off really really lightly for wrecking wetland and sandblasting the neighbourhood. The reason the deluge system was installed so quickly is exactly the reason you can't argue that 'they wanted to see if they could do without'. They knew a priori that it was necessary, that's why they'd basically already staged the hardware. Installing a deluge system pre-launch would have cost them a month, a month that they wouldn't have spent afterwards, waiting for another round of sign-offs. It was a dumb decision and posting fan-blogs like Teslarati isn't a good argument.
icegreentea2 2y ago
News from the time the rigs were sold were relatively clear https://spacenews.com/spacex-drops-plans-to-covert-oil-rigs-into-launch-platforms/ https://spacenews.com/spacex-drops-plans-to-covert-oil-rigs-... Shotwell said "They were not the right platform" and that they needed "to first start launching Starship and better understand that vehicle before building offshore launch platforms". The stated goal of Starship is that the booster can be refueled and relaunched from the recovery tower within hours. So "launch platform" is a misnomer, these guys are ideally also recovery platforms (with the chopsticks and all that). In addition, even if an offshore platform could work for booster recovery, it still needs a Starship to be stacked. There's probably a bunch of concern about having a Starship sitting around in the open near a booster recovery (the exact effect of blast/debris around a booster recovery is probably one thing they'd want to characterize).

a12k 2y ago

Texas is just a much better and cheaper option. It retains the upsides of sea launches (being able to select location, being far from people) without the downsides (being out in the water vs landlocked). They can also take advantage of US infrastructure and legal stability, which are downsides noted in the article about equatorial locations, while retaining the upsides of those areas in the form of not needing to worry about pollution, and very malleable state laws. Basically Texas is as good as it gets if you’re amoral and running a company with large externalities.

cubefox 2y ago
I think Texas is currently used for testing purposes while the main Starship launch site will be in Kennedy Space Center, Florida. It's currently being built. Still, that's not a new fact, so there must have been a reason why they first thought offshore space ports were a valuable addition and then later changed their mind.
jltsiren 2y ago
One upside of sea launches is the ability to choose any heading, which makes reaching the desired orbit easier. When launching from land, you have a limited range of possible headings, unless you are willing to launch over populated areas. For example, rockets launched from Florida to ISS initially head northeast. A similar launch from Boca Chica would place the trajectory uncomfortably close to Houston.

pr337h4m 2y ago

For ships, stability seems to be the main problem: https://x.com/BrentM_SpaceX/status/1885450296421208118 https://x.com/BrentM_SpaceX/status/1885450296421208118 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1885508628582474040 https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1885508628582474040 Not sure about oil rigs

ghaff 2y ago
Semi-submersibles--which is what Sea Launch was (former Ocean Odyssey)--are pretty stable. The marine risers (i.e. the big pipes that connect to the subsea blowout preventer) don't tolerate a lot of angle. Source: Used to work on, among other things, offshore drilling rig mooring analysis. But I can imagine all sorts of reasons why using an offshore platform introduces a bunch of challenges that launching from land doesn't have. Though of course, the ability to get away from people is a plus too.
- hermitcrab 2y ago
  One of my wife's relatives was the master for the sea trials for one of the ships involved in Sea Launch. He had an incredible career, starting off as a brass helmet diver for the Royal Navy and ending up with Sea Launch.
simne 2y ago
That's why SL used most sophisticated rocket of time - Zenit, which was by definition extremely tolerant to platform instability (most other space rockets was not so tolerant).

mannykannot 2y ago

Despite Musk's whining about the FAA, SpaceX is not facing any difficulties getting its rockets launched from land, so there's no reason, at this point, to add something else with the potential to slow things down. It did not even want to build a proper launchpad at Boca Chica, which did not work out so well.

pfdietz 2y ago
It worked out fine. It's an example of iterative design where you find out the problems of an approach by doing the experiment, rather than by analysis, where you find out and have to address all the nonexistent imaginary problems too.
- philipwhiuk 2y ago
  Except we'd already done a lot of experiments and you don't have to test it at full scale to realise it's gonna be chaos. Yes, there's some interesting papers post-fact on the ejecta but it was still dumb.
  - s1artibartfast 2y ago
    My understanding is that it was a matter of timeline. They simply did not want to wait and we're willing to trade off the consequences. SpaceX was already shipping a fabricated deluge system to Starbase 3 months before the first flight tore up the LaunchPad [1]. At the end of the day, the rocket did get off the pad. The repair was completed and the ready waiting deluge system installed in less than 3 months. This aspect is always lost in the bluster from Musk, and claims of incompetence from critics. https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starbase-starship-deluge-system-florida-shipment/ https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starbase-starship-deluge-sy...
    - philipwhiuk 2y ago
      The alternative view is they got off really really lightly for wrecking wetland and sandblasting the neighbourhood. The reason the deluge system was installed so quickly is exactly the reason you can't argue that 'they wanted to see if they could do without'. They knew a priori that it was necessary, that's why they'd basically already staged the hardware. Installing a deluge system pre-launch would have cost them a month, a month that they wouldn't have spent afterwards, waiting for another round of sign-offs. It was a dumb decision and posting fan-blogs like Teslarati isn't a good argument.

icegreentea2 2y ago

News from the time the rigs were sold were relatively clear https://spacenews.com/spacex-drops-plans-to-covert-oil-rigs-into-launch-platforms/ https://spacenews.com/spacex-drops-plans-to-covert-oil-rigs-... Shotwell said "They were not the right platform" and that they needed "to first start launching Starship and better understand that vehicle before building offshore launch platforms". The stated goal of Starship is that the booster can be refueled and relaunched from the recovery tower within hours. So "launch platform" is a misnomer, these guys are ideally also recovery platforms (with the chopsticks and all that). In addition, even if an offshore platform could work for booster recovery, it still needs a Starship to be stacked. There's probably a bunch of concern about having a Starship sitting around in the open near a booster recovery (the exact effect of blast/debris around a booster recovery is probably one thing they'd want to characterize).