3 ms·

I've talked about this a few times before but – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726133 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726133 / https://news.ycomb

I've talked about this a few times before but – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726133 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726133 / https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726078 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726078 - to repeat myself; It's because we're a very primitive species, and the forces involved here are genuinely new. It's physically not possible at our current level of technology to make this "safer" due to the distances and energies involved. I will let John Young explain it his way; > ‘You put some people on top of four million pounds of high explosives, you light the fuse, and in eight and a half minutes they are going eight times faster than a rifle bullet. What part of that sounds safe to you?’ As an aside, if you've never heard of John Young, I recommend learning a bit about him. He was an incredible person. And that statement is very funny in his voice; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KezwDfFcFhU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KezwDfFcFhU He test flew the shuttle. They put an ejection seat in the shuttle – which was obviously insane. And a reporter asks him about ejecting while the solid rocket motors were burning, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLU4CK7UHd4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLU4CK7UHd4 (I'm deeply saddened that I will never get to meet the man and ask him the secret to his magical heart rate.)

stringfood 5mo ago
why did you preface this with how many times you've made your point to deaf ears in the past? Am I supposed to follow your opinions across the site?
- LtWorf 5mo ago
  Did you know that we are a primitive species though? (up to anyone to guess what that means)
  - NetMageSCW 5mo ago
    It means we like digital watches.
- areoform 5mo ago
  It used to be a thing that people did when repeating a comment. I've used HN for a very long time. It's a form of manners from those days so that people know that I'm not just spamming something. I think a lot of the people who used to write like that are gone. Most metaphorically, some physically. I'm trying to keep the tradition alive.
  - stringfood 5mo ago
    well in that case I apologize for being part of the group that tears rhetoric like yours down as inefficient and unnecessary
userbinator 5mo ago
and the forces involved here are genuinely new I remember growing up with things proudly advertised as "space-age technology"... which largely meant the 1950s and 1960s, and of course it's what got us to the moon, multiple times. Yet more than a half a century later, new rockets just don't seem that impressive in comparison.
- swiftcoder 5mo ago
  > Yet more than a half a century later, new rockets just don't seem that impressive in comparison We have 15x reduction in payload-to-orbit costs, 20x increase in launches/year, significantly increased reliability during missions (test explosions like this one are tests for a reason), and reliable vertical landings with reusable lower stages. The current crop of rockets may not be as visually impressive as a Saturn 5, but they are well on their way to making orbital space flight a commodity rather than a risky experiment
  - adev_ 5mo ago
    > and reliable vertical landings We know how to do reliable vertical landing since the DCXA in 1991. Meaning more than 25y ago [1] > reliability during missions (test explosions like this one are tests for a reason) Static fire tests are routine since the 60s, nothing new here either [2]. > We have 15x reduction in payload-to-orbit costs This is about manufacturing optimization and it has very little to do with rocket safety. > hey are well on their way to making orbital space flight a commodity They are not. It is at best marketing speech. The access to space is at best cheaper but will never be commodity. The parent post is right on point: Rockets todays are still fundamentally the same giant bomb filled at 85% with explosive that we were making in the 60s. And this is unlikely to change and unlikely to ever be safe. There is very valid reasons to that: we still did not find anything better than chemical propulsion to go in the last 80 years. It is the only 'working' solution in term of the energy density required to bring us there: - Ion thrusters have amazing Isp but nowhere the Thrust/Weight ratio required to launch from Earth. - Nuclear propulsion is good on paper but controversial in practice for pretty obvious reasons. So we are still stuck. Stuck with burning 1'000t of highly inflammable Ergols in few minutes to just push any blob in orbit. With very thin engineering margins, way thiner than in airplane manufacturing or currently pretty any other domain. And that make it unlikely to ever be really "safe" and accessible to the mass. At least, not before we find a better solution to the problem. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBar3FyI_cA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBar3FyI_cA [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rP6k18DVdg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rP6k18DVdg
worldsavior 5mo ago
"very primitive" - primitive in relation to who? As a species we control the planet, we rule every other species currently known to humans, how is that primitive?
makerofthings 5mo ago
We might well be the most advanced species in the universe. Seems unlikely, but we really don’t have anything else to measure against at the moment.

stringfood 5mo ago

why did you preface this with how many times you've made your point to deaf ears in the past? Am I supposed to follow your opinions across the site?

LtWorf 5mo ago
Did you know that we are a primitive species though? (up to anyone to guess what that means)
- NetMageSCW 5mo ago
  It means we like digital watches.
areoform 5mo ago
It used to be a thing that people did when repeating a comment. I've used HN for a very long time. It's a form of manners from those days so that people know that I'm not just spamming something. I think a lot of the people who used to write like that are gone. Most metaphorically, some physically. I'm trying to keep the tradition alive.
- stringfood 5mo ago
  well in that case I apologize for being part of the group that tears rhetoric like yours down as inefficient and unnecessary

userbinator 5mo ago

and the forces involved here are genuinely new I remember growing up with things proudly advertised as "space-age technology"... which largely meant the 1950s and 1960s, and of course it's what got us to the moon, multiple times. Yet more than a half a century later, new rockets just don't seem that impressive in comparison.

swiftcoder 5mo ago
> Yet more than a half a century later, new rockets just don't seem that impressive in comparison We have 15x reduction in payload-to-orbit costs, 20x increase in launches/year, significantly increased reliability during missions (test explosions like this one are tests for a reason), and reliable vertical landings with reusable lower stages. The current crop of rockets may not be as visually impressive as a Saturn 5, but they are well on their way to making orbital space flight a commodity rather than a risky experiment
- adev_ 5mo ago
  > and reliable vertical landings We know how to do reliable vertical landing since the DCXA in 1991. Meaning more than 25y ago [1] > reliability during missions (test explosions like this one are tests for a reason) Static fire tests are routine since the 60s, nothing new here either [2]. > We have 15x reduction in payload-to-orbit costs This is about manufacturing optimization and it has very little to do with rocket safety. > hey are well on their way to making orbital space flight a commodity They are not. It is at best marketing speech. The access to space is at best cheaper but will never be commodity. The parent post is right on point: Rockets todays are still fundamentally the same giant bomb filled at 85% with explosive that we were making in the 60s. And this is unlikely to change and unlikely to ever be safe. There is very valid reasons to that: we still did not find anything better than chemical propulsion to go in the last 80 years. It is the only 'working' solution in term of the energy density required to bring us there: - Ion thrusters have amazing Isp but nowhere the Thrust/Weight ratio required to launch from Earth. - Nuclear propulsion is good on paper but controversial in practice for pretty obvious reasons. So we are still stuck. Stuck with burning 1'000t of highly inflammable Ergols in few minutes to just push any blob in orbit. With very thin engineering margins, way thiner than in airplane manufacturing or currently pretty any other domain. And that make it unlikely to ever be really "safe" and accessible to the mass. At least, not before we find a better solution to the problem. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBar3FyI_cA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBar3FyI_cA [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rP6k18DVdg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rP6k18DVdg

worldsavior 5mo ago

"very primitive" - primitive in relation to who? As a species we control the planet, we rule every other species currently known to humans, how is that primitive?

makerofthings 5mo ago

We might well be the most advanced species in the universe. Seems unlikely, but we really don’t have anything else to measure against at the moment.