9 ms·
Starship Flight 9 booster explodes on impact [video]
- corey_moncure 1y agoIts venting gas and yawing again. None of that deploy and re-entry stuff is gonna happen.
- jiggawatts 1y agoEveryday Astronaut feed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6tP0il4z64 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6tP0il4z64
- t1234s 1y agoGetting some good video from inside starship. Any info on how tall the interior is?
- jprd 1y ago[flagged]
- 725686 1y agoAlso, Starship is out of control now.
- bamboozled 1y agoWhat do you mean? We don't know where it will land?
- Polizeiposaune 1y agoIt lost attitude control not all that long after the engines cut off, so it didn't reenter under control, heat shield first -- but it was under control while the engines were running. orbital mechanics puts bounds on where the parts that survive reentry will land (inside the declared danger zone).
- teruakohatu 1y agoMaybe I missed it but when the booster was supposed to land or begin the landing burn it was lost by the cameras so it probably impacted somewhere other than where it was supposed to land.
- jordanb 1y agoIt exploded at the start of the landing burn, not on impact. This was the first attempt to re-use a booster.
- ls612 1y agoBooster was not intended to be recovered. They said before launch they were intentionally testing how far they could push it until it exploded so they knew what the true limits are.
- goku12 1y agoThe commentary gives me the impression that the booster didn't fail due to the reasons they were expecting it to. I think that they were expecting a successful engine relight and an eventual destruction due to loss of vehicle control.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- jml7c5 1y agoFrom what I've read, the booster was intentionally being tested to its limits — an explosion isn't necessarily unexpected. They weren't aiming to catch it, it was being ditched in the ocean. Whether this counts as a "true" booster failure depends on exactly what failed.
- timschmidt 1y agoExactly. They're still exploring limits and failure modes. Hence the effort to re-fly a used booster on an aggressive trajectory when they have multiple newer revisions ready to go. Looking forward to the first launch with Raptor 3. Also really can't understate the importance of Starlink in the development program. Apollo jettisoned parachuting return capsules from the interstages so that engineers could get camera footage from inside the rocket during launch. SpaceX just gets an RTSP stream (or something similar).
- SyzygyRhythm 1y agoIt's the original definition of "pushing the envelope." You start with a known flight envelope, then push a little past that. Sometimes you learn that the real envelope is bigger than you thought. Other times you find that the envelope is exactly where you thought it was.
- timschmidt 1y agoI notice I mis-typed and should have said you can't overstate the importance of Starlink on the development program. And I agree with you about pushing the envelope. It was really interesting to hear that they were planning on testing an engine-out scenario with this booster by lighting one of the middle 10 engines and two centers. If they can pull that off, they'll have a measurable increase in fault tolerance over Falcon 9.
- __m 1y agois igniting the engine pushing the envelope though?
- chilmers 1y ago[flagged]
- bell-cot 1y agoThat I've heard of, Elon's Jeckyll/Hyde issues have been well-known at SpaceX for twoish decades. Employees (not just engineers) who couldn't look past those would self-select out over that same time frame. Flipside, people who prioritize working for an actual, high-functioning rocket company have been self-selecting in to SpaceX over the past decade or so.
- jmyeet 1y agoSpaceX is, for many of us, what made many of us (myself included) not realize what a raging moron Elon Musk was and is for the longest time. I've come to believe that SpaceX succeeded in spite of Elon, not because of him. Whoever is really in charge has probably built an organization that is designed to insulate itself from Elon's influence. And Falcon 9 is an unmitited success, to be sure. SpaceX basically owns the launch market because of it. But eventually the chickens come home to roost and I really wonder if Starship will be the downfall of SpaceX. Let me explain. Commercial space launches to LEO are SpaceX's bread and butter. There are over 100 a year now and whatever the cost of refurbishing used Falcon 9 first stage boosters is, I think the volume of launches (even if you exclude the induced demand from Starlink launches) has locked in an economic advantage for commercial launches for the next 10-20 years, in a similar way the 747 did for Boeing in the commercial aviation market. It's just that dominant. But you have to ask what problem Starship solves. SpaceX already has a heavier launch capability (ie Falcon Heavy) but there's little demand for it. There have been 11 Falcon Heavy launches total AFAICT. So what is Starship going to launch? You might say that there will be new payloads once the launch capability exists.but we've simply seen no evidence of this thus far. Starship is more complex, specifically the Raptor engines. You have two cooled propellants instead of one (because of coking with Merlin engines). In-orbit refueling is going to take so long to prove and perfect for some of the stated goals. And Starship just isn't designed to land on things with a human crew. If a Starship booster lands on Moon (or Mars, which will never happen), your astronauts are 40 meters in the air. This is... far from ideal. The US government simply won't allow SpaceX to fail. It's a national security issue. So I guess this doesn't matter. And it may be that the Falcon 9 cash cow props the company up from any number of boondoggles. If Starship reaches its reliability and cost targets, it will lower the LEO payload cost per kg significantly but that's a lot of ifs and a ton of investment. But if you're not sending up a huge payload, you just don't need that. Starlink is fairly unique in being such a large constellation on similar orbits that you can launch them on a single orbit. Launching multiple satellites in vastly different orbits is not something a single rocket can do.
- timschmidt 1y agoReading this comment gave me flashbacks of every time a non-engineer bean counter rug-pulled the funding from an almost complete project because they didn't understand or trust the engineering process. The starship program seems more likely to suffer from overpopularity due to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
- guidedlight 1y ago“We had a couple of issues, but importantly we did launch on time”
- globalnode 1y agothey were 5 mins late, so almost on time.
- randallsquared 1y agoAny time during the launch window is "on time".
- TheAlchemist 1y ago[flagged]
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- deadlydose 1y agoShould they not be lighthearted and optimistic? Or did you leave a comment just to vent some of your personal grievances with a dash of JAQing off?
- timschmidt 1y agoFailure is part of the process and they're quite open about it and have a wonderful sense of humor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvim4rsNHkQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvim4rsNHkQ Every launch is a learning experience and leads toward success.
- jordanb 1y ago[dead]
- TMWNN 1y ago> Feels like FSD for the past 10 years all over again (this time funded directly by US taxpayers). Neither SpaceX nor Starship is subsidized in any way. SpaceX does have a contract for providing a Starship-based lander for Artemis's HLS, but that is (as with all other SpaceX government contracts) paid based on benchmarks and/or final delivery.
- postalrat 1y agois there a better choice for that funding? as far as i know spacex has been and is still doing things better than any alternative.
- darkteflon 1y agoOh man, couldn’t disagree with this more strongly. SpaceX make an effort to be pretty transparent about what they’re trying to achieve and what constitutes failure. FSD is vapourware; SpaceX has been successfully launching and landing - now catching - rocket first stages for years. This is quality stuff.
- stephc_int13 1y agoThe important part of this flight was not the booster but the Starship. Last two launches failed in a similar fashion a short time after separation. SpaceX will be in hot water if this launch is not showing some progress in that regard.
- decimalenough 1y agoThey did make major progress: this is the first time Starship completed SECO and successfully made it into stable orbit. Unfortunately there was a fuel leak later that caused the craft to spin and made controlled reentry impossible.
- echoangle 1y agoThere was no stable orbit, the ship was suborbital during the entire flight (as planned).
- decimalenough 1y agoReally? Wikipedia says they "made it to orbital velocity", and I thought their original plan was to do a full orbit of the Earth before reentry.
- none_to_remain 1y agoOrbital velocity but not orbital trajectory.
- pfdietz 1y agoVelocity is a vector, so it would be more proper to say "orbital speed". But no one does that.
- BobaFloutist 1y agoVectors are location independent, so theoretically any velocity with sufficiently high speed would be orbital velocity even if it was pointed directly at the planet, no?
- xnx 1y agoOfficial video: https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=starship-flight-9 https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=starship-...
- none_to_remain 1y ago2025: watching live footage from a doomed spaceship as it tumbles out of control through its own vented gases, all tinged red, as a synth soundtrack plays. (The soundtrack was on the X.com stream, seems cut from this link.)
- pulvinar 1y agoThough they missed an opportunity: Philip Glass (Koyaanisqatsi) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJrtROuQFfk&t=9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJrtROuQFfk&t=9s
- runarberg 1y agoSuch a good movie... Do you happen to know which spacecraft this was?
- RichardCA 1y agoIt's very close to Apollo 11 but the match is not precise. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUQgBPjGmAQ#t=35 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUQgBPjGmAQ#t=35 AFIAK no one has ever done an exhaustive analysis of the provenance of all that stock footage. This is an example of someone chasing it down. I don't think it's been done for all the Saturn V launches (Apollo 4 thru the last Skylab launch). That would be a big ask. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBITROWVcok https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBITROWVcok As a kid growing up in the 70's it was perfectly normal to see a documentary about Apollo 11 where they throw in the Apollo 4 Stage 2 ring separation like it was no big deal. The awareness of all these subtle differences is a recent development.
- pulvinar 1y agoAnd also starting at 0:43 in that clip is the rocket that explodes, an Atlas-Centaur on its maiden flight on May 8, 1962. It was the Centaur upper stage that failed, but I believe we see the Atlas booster engines tumbling.
- staplung 1y agoSummary: launched to the point that starship separated successfully. The booster appears to have exploded on its landing burn. They never intended to catch this booster but they didn't expect it to explode during the landing burn. Starship meanwhile got all the way to SECO, which is farther than the previous two missions. They were not able to open the pez-dispenser door to launch the starlink dummies. Some time after that it became clear that starship was tumbling out of control. They did not attempt to relight the engines. Reentry was uncontrolled.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- goku12 1y agoOne important additional detail is that the Starship started shedding debris (both inside and outside) and tumbling slowly, right after SECO. A leak also seems to have developed at the same time - which would explain the gradually worsening tumble rates. Leaks are unfortunately difficult to distinguish from intentional venting, if you're unfamiliar with the venting scheme. However, it's more or less surely a leak(s), especially given that the same were not observed in previous flights.
- __MatrixMan__ 1y agoI enjoyed this video of [what turns out to be an unrelated] explosion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep8XJanoFgw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep8XJanoFgw At about 0:39 a pressurized tank of something does a whimsical loop-de-loop into the plume of fire and it's hard not to feel like the little guy is just having so much fun.
- GMoromisato 1y agoI'm rooting for SpaceX because no one else in the world is even attempting to do what they're doing. Every single time SpaceX has set a goal, there were detractors who claimed they would never accomplish it. And along the way, there were plenty of failures that almost proved the detractors right. But every time--so far at least--SpaceX persevered and eventually succeeded. When SpaceX decided to re-use their boosters, most people thought they were idiots. They would never be able to do it, and even if they did, it would never make financial sense. Even today, SpaceX is the only company to fly with "flight-proven" boosters, but no one is skeptical anymore. Almost every new launch vehicle, including several Chinese ones, are designed to be re-usable. When SpaceX decided to build the Falcon Heavy, with 27 first-stage engines, many people thought it would fail. "Remember the N1," they said, which was doomed from the start because they could never get all its engines to work together. But the Falcon Heavy worked and gave us those indelible views of twin boosters landings. When SpaceX decided to build Starlink, many people thought it was crazy. 5,000 satellites!? Are you crazy? How are you going to manufacture, much less launch that many satellites? Today they have 7,500 working satellites and they are literally launching more twice a week. Starlink has changed the communications satellite industry (there are at least 3 serious competitors). I remember the first Starship launch, when 5 of its 33 engines failed almost immediately. Skeptics thought the Raptor engine was dead on arrival. Too complicated compared to the proven Merlins and way too unreliable to power Starship. They will never get it to work. And yet, in later flights, all 33 engines worked perfectly all the way to ascent. No one worries about the booster anymore. When I first heard they were going to catch a returning booster at the launch tower I thought they were mad. I thought that was a long-term plan that might happen sometime in 2030, after they refined the system. But no, they went ahead and caught it on Flight 5. Since then they have caught two other boosters and have reflown one in Flight 9. People who don't follow the space industry don't yet realize how revolutionary Starship it. It is not just the largest rocket in history; its crazy goal is to be able to launch, land, and then launch again with minimal refurbishment and minimal cost. If all they wanted to do is launch something to orbit and discard the rocket, SpaceX could have done it on their first flight with a much less ambitious design. The reason it's taking so long (and will continue to take so long) is because their ultimate goal is something no one has come close to achieving: a rocket that can be reused like an airliner. Musk once quipped that SpaceX is good at turning 'impossible' into 'late'. It's true that they have missed almost every single deadline they have ever set. But it's also true that the things SpaceX has done were once deemed to be impossible. And that's why I'm rooting for them, no matter how many ships they blow up.
- nodesocket 1y agoThe official SpaceX stream is much higher quality with better camera angles and commentary in my opinion. https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=starship-flight-9 https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=starship-...
- jiggawatts 1y ago"The media could not be played." Unlike YouTube, the X player is increasingly broken.
- nodesocket 1y agoWorks fine for me. Are you blocking X?
- jiggawatts 1y agoNo, but X blocks me because I prefer not to create an account.
- mlindner 1y agoIt only requires an account if you access it from a phone. Using desktop and there's no issue (which is better anyway as most phones can't display 4K content).
- jiggawatts 1y agoIt might not like Firefox, Ad Block, or something. I don’t care enough to troubleshoot because the best outcome is that I can access X.
- antisol 1y agothis headline is wrong. It didn't explode on impact, it exploded when they tried to do the landing burn. We think. We don't really know, just yet, because there's no video of this, despite the headline implying that there's video of the explosion.
- cubefox 1y agoHere is the obligatory summary/analysis by Scott Manley: https://youtube.com/watch?v=aqQM1AfpSZI https://youtube.com/watch?v=aqQM1AfpSZI
- shirro 1y agoMany spaceflight fans struggle to distinguish between F9 and Starship and think success with one guarantees another. Go back and read what Fred Brooks writes about second systems. The super heavy booster is extremely impressive, particularly the raptor engines and control systems. Their engineers need to be commended for that alone. The weight is questionable and it isn't clear how much the performance is compromised but its still a very impressive vehicle and future engine refinements are going to help. The second stage remains a huge concern. The economics of Starship are predicated on cheap, rapid second stage reuse. That huge multi engine second stage is a lot more expensive than the F9's disposable single engine second stage. Creating a robust, rapidly reusable thermal management system for orbital re-entry is an unsolved problem. I don't believe anyone, including SpaceX has a solution. With time and huge amounts of money they can iterate through the other problems and likely do a controlled re-entry and recovery with the second stage but the vehicle isn't going to be close to reusable. It is a massive problem and I think it makes a fiction of the entire program and turns it into a money pit. If you piece the system out though. The engines, the control systems etc, there is a lot of good stuff there for another system. I think the Mars colonisation BS worked well to inspire the troops and raise money and political interest but they seem to be in a corner with this design. It is looking very possible this system will never enter commercial service.