A Failure For SpaceX: Falcon 9 Explodes During Ascension 316
MouseR writes with bad news about this morning's SpaceX launch: About 2:19 into its flight, Falcon 9 exploded along stage 2 and the Dragon capsule, before even the stage 1 separation. Telemetry and videos are inconclusive, without further analysis as to what went wrong. Everything was green lights. This is a catastrophe for SpaceX, which enjoyed, until now, a perfect launch record.
TechCrunch has coverage of the failure, which of course also means that today's planned stage one return attempt has failed before it could start; watch this space for more links.
Update: 06/28 15:06 GMT by T : See also stories
at NBC News,
The Washington Post, and the Associated Press (via ABC News). According to the Washington Post, what was a catastrophe for this morning's launch is only a setback for the ISS and its crew, rather than a disaster:
A NASA slide from an April presentation said that with current food levels, the space station would reach what NASA calls “reserve level” on July 24 and run out by Sept. 5, according to SpaceNews.
[NASA spokeswoman Stephanie] Schierholz said, however, that the supplies would last until the fall, although she could not provide a precise date. Even if something were to go wrong with the SpaceX flight, she said, there are eight more scheduled this year, including several this summer, “so there are plenty of ways to ensure the station continues to be well-supplied.”
Of note: One bit of cargo that was aboard the SpaceX craft was a Microsoft Hololens; hopefully another will make it onto one of the upcoming supply runs instead.
Elon Musk has posted a note on the company's Twitter channel: "Falcon 9 experienced a problem shortly before first stage shutdown. Will provide more info as soon as we review the data."
Elon Musk has posted a note on the company's Twitter channel: "Falcon 9 experienced a problem shortly before first stage shutdown. Will provide more info as soon as we review the data."
Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's a gif of the failure: http://imgur.com/SYwUIbI [imgur.com]
Looks like:
1. Second stage comes apart in a cloud of oxygen and fuel.
2. Dragon spacecraft falls off / gets overtaken by first stage.
3. First stage is destroyed.
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Informative)
Leave it to LiveLeak for actual video:
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i... [liveleak.com]
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Leave it to LiveLeak for actual video:
"LiveLeak", the last couple of years, is just a YouTube clone... (actual videos from "YouTube": https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] - and many other, added at the same time the video from "LiveLeak" was added)
Where are the current videos of Muslims beheading people? NOT on LiveLeak! Just a couple of days ago i watched Muslims drowning some people closed in a cage and submerged in a pool - NOT on LiveLeak of course, because "Redefining th
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Funny)
Do they have videos of Greek Nationalists paying their taxes? Oh wait...no such thing exists :)
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or inventing trigonometry?
Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi introduced Europe to algebra, the base ten numbering system and the concept of "zero".
Thabit ibn Qurra: first Ptolemaic Reformer and founder of statics.
Ibn Al-Haytham: tenth Century pioneer of complex optical systems.
Ibn Zuhr: gave us food groups. In the TWELFTH Century.
Writing Muslims off as corner-shop camel jockeys is just... passé, to put it extremely politely.
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:4, Insightful)
To be fair, all these were very long ago.
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the Arabs had algebra in the bag five HUNDRED years BEFORE Descartes.
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Interesting)
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They had just gotten a tight long-range picture of it and were switching between that and the shot from inside the second stage when the long shot went all star-bursty
Long silence from the commentator on the space-x broadcast, probably shut off all the mikes while they cursed a blue streak
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I woke up to the news of this (I usually watch but entered the time wrong on my calendar), and the first thing that I thought of was the docking adapter, IDA-1. I imagine an IDA-3 will be built and flown, but I wonder how long it will take to build and if the delay will impact future missions.
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:4, Interesting)
Is it just me or does it look possible Dragon survived? It would be interesting if it came down under chutes.
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Dibs!
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Informative)
Dragon tore clear, but was tumbling far too much to be able to deploy parachutes.
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In the time I could see it on the video it looked like it was reoriented itself heat shield first which is the natural passive orientation. It could have deployed chutes later.
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Possibly, if it was programmed to do so. But they probably don't program for that because no recovery ship would have been available anyway.
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At 3:24, if you step frame-by-frame, you can see what looks like a large object [imgur.com] flying up away from the rocket. That might be the capsule. If it survived, that would be amazing.
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Sorry, it's ~T+2:23 (3:24 is the point in the video I linked elsewhere in the comments).
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Looks like the second stage ruptured (Score:5, Interesting)
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Based on Elon's cryptic comment on Twitter I think you might perhaps be on to something.
"There was an overpressure event in the upper stage liquid oxygen tank. Data suggests counterintuitive cause."
Sounds to me like "the vent on the second stage oxygen tank was venting too fast and / or not smoothly enough".
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I think both the upper and lower stages use pressure for reinforcing the structure. If the tank vented then it could collapse.
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would be interesting to find out if the root cause of the failure is something they left out to cut costs... probably why SpaceX refuse to talk about money (although, they're not above begging the Treasury for a cut of NASA's budget, citing State-backed competition from Russia for the crewed flight development)...
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If you mean the puff toward the top of the stack around the time it went supersonic, I think that was just a vapor cone from the transition to supersonic flight.
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and SpaceX video(with telemetry) [youtube.com]
More information about what projects were lost
Test pollination stimulation for food crops in low gravity
Test new type of plastic developed to block radiation from the Sun
The Meteor investigation takes high-resolution video and images of the atmosphere and uses a software program to search for bright spots
Test a theory that fuel sprays change from partial to group combustion as flames spread across a cloud of droplets
The Telo
Missed it! But, here's the video... (Score:5, Interesting)
I slept in and missed the launch, but here's a video of the CRS-7 launch and subsequent explosion [youtube.com].
Re:Missed it! But, here's the video... (Score:5, Interesting)
If you pause the video at 3:16 you can see a tiny white dot on the second stage. I don't think that dot is suppose to be there (unless it's the sun reflecting off something shiny or something). Fuel / oxygen tank leak?
Re:Missed it! But, here's the video... (Score:5, Interesting)
You're right, it looks like something venting out the side (you can see a little cloud there). Then that area comes apart. The flames from the engines appear to flare up, suggesting oxygen? Then, it starts burning hotter in the area you mentioned, looking like maybe it's burning it's way down into the lower stage. That fire gives out, but it's immediately followed by RUD.
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Could well be. The 'anomaly' clearly started at the second stage. Of note, it is in the 'Max-Q' region where the booster is subject to the most aerodynamic stress. Most booster booms occurs either right off the pad or at Max-Q.
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Yep, that seems to be it [twitter.com].
There was an overpressure event in the upper stage liquid oxygen tank. Data suggests counterintuitive cause.
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I believe those are the grid fins for steering the F9 on it's way back.
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Yeah, it could be the grind fins.
It could also be condensation caused by under-pressure caused by the humps (the solar panel covers) on the Dragon.
It's called Rocket Science for a reason ... (Score:5, Insightful)
SpaceX has been very forthcoming with their telemetry data and analysis, so hopefully we'll hear what happened soon.
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Huh? The most they've ever released is standard PR fluff/stuff - "we ran out of hydraulic fluid", "the valve failed", etc... No data, no analysis.
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The cameras pulled back to show the launch facility, which was not of interest as the failure occurred at altitude.
Well, what else are you going to show, if you've lost your video feed from the vehicle and the tracking camera shows nothing but blue sky? Patch-in a feed from Sesame Street?
My concern is, how long is this going to put SpaceX out of commission? How many months (or years) will it take to track down the source of this failure and bring the Falcon family of rockets back online?
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I watched SpaceX's own feed. The cameras kept on the vehicle for the duration of the failure and kept tracking some larger pieces of first stage debris for several seconds after it exploded. Beyond that point there would not be any large pieces of vehicle left to look at, except perhaps for the Dragon spacecraft which looked relatively intact.
I for one doubt that they did manage to get a camera on the Dragon before it crashed into the ocean.
Re:It's called Rocket Science for a reason ... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's initial incident analysis that doesn't need quarterbacking from people who don't have access to internal data. With SpaceX, so many people are anti-Elon that within minutes, people were declaring the company a failure and wondering how long it would take for the entire company to collapse. Orbital Sciences has the advantage that far fewer people even know who they are and they don't have legions of people hoping for them to fail, so being more open up front doesn't carry as much of a downside.
so it's not just Russia eh? (Score:3, Insightful)
Funny how when Russian rockets fail it is because of those "no good drunken Russians", but when a US rocket fails, its because rocket science is complex and challenging.
Re:so it's not just Russia eh? (Score:4, Insightful)
Just a few months ago, Musk cultists here on Slashdot were virtually cheering [slashdot.org] when an Orbital Sciences launch failed. Everyone was piling on them for using Russian engines and singing the praises [slashdot.org] of the infallible SpaceX. I guess payback's a bitch.
As reported on the Farm Report (Score:5, Funny)
'It blowed up. It blowed up real good' [youtube.com]
For all those who ragged on Orbital Sciences (Score:2)
See, *everyone* fails sometimes, even your hero Elon Musk.
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I ragged on them for using inadequately tested components. Part of their secret sauce is their test program. It's not saucy enough.
That doesn't mean the ol' Musketeer won't experience some setbacks on his path to Mars. What they're trying to do is also difficult. I think it's also more worthwhile. Time should tell.
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Final Tally (Score:5, Informative)
Ariane 1 - second and fifth launches failed
Ariane 2 - only 6 launches, first failed
Ariane 3 - fifth launch failed
Ariane 4 - eighth launch failed
Ariane 5 - first launch failed, two partial failures in first 11
Atlas A - only 8 launches, 5 failed
Atlas B - only 10 launches, 3 failed
Atlas C - only 6 launches, 2 failed
Delta - first launch failed
Delta II - first nineteen successful, partial failure on the 42nd launch which substantially reduced the satellite's operational lifespan (55th was first total failure)
Falcon 1 - only five launches, first three failed
Falcon 9 - nineteenth launch failed (Secondary payload on the 4th launch aborted as a precaution)
Long March 1 - only 2 launches, both successful
Long March 2 - first launch failed
Long March 3 - no complete failures in first 11, but 1 and 8 were partial failures
N-1 - only four launches, all failed horribly
Proton - third launch failed
Proton-K - second, third, fourth and sixth launches failed
Proton-M - eleventh launch failed
Saturn I - only ten launches, all successful
Saturn IB - only nine launches, all successful (unless you count Apollo 1 - it didn't launch but still killed three astronauts)
Saturn V - second launch (Apollo 6) failed, Apollo 13 doesn't count because it was a payload, not launcher, failure
Soyuz - third launch failed, with fatalities
Soyuz-U - seventh launch failed
Soyuz-FG - first nineteen launches successful (all 49 to date completely successful, including lots and lots of astronauts delivered to ISS)
Space Shuttle - nineteenth launch a partial failure (ATO) (25th was first total failure)
Titan I - fifth, sixth, eighth, ninth and tenth launches failed
Titan II - ninth and eleventh launches failed
Titan III - first and sixth launches failed
Titan IV - seventh launch failed
Zenit-2 - first and second launches failed
It was a good run, but the game is over. Falcon 9 slots in to the rankings as fourth in the history of rocket development, with a success record exceeded only by Shuttle, Soyuz-FG, and Delta II.
Maybe Falcon 9 Heavy will have better luck.
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Depending on how you measure "success record". The ones that have no failures (Saturn I, Long March 1) would seem to have an unbeatable success record by at least one metric. :)
Re:Final Tally (Score:4, Insightful)
That's an awesome list. It dramatically demonstrates that getting a booster into space is anything but easy.
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once you're in space, you're halfway to anywhere.
(Heinlein?)
Re:Final Tally (Score:4, Informative)
It dramatically demonstrates that getting a booster into space is anything but easy.
Or at least it was in the '50s and '60s.
Falcon 9 track record is nothing exceptional for a current design like Delta II and IV, Vega, H-IIB, Soyuz-FG, Minotaur... Even Ariane 5 now is at 65 straight successful launches.
Forgetting something? (Score:5, Informative)
Where's the Ariane Vega, or the Japanese H2 launchers or the PSLV in that list?
Vega - five launches, five successful.
H2 (A and B variants) - thirty-two launches, one failure.
PSLV - twenty-nine launches, one total failure (the first), one partial where the final stage underperformed but the payload satellite used its own propulsion system to get to the correct orbit.
That moves the Falcon 9 down the listings a bit, I think.
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The Soyuz-FG has an incredible record given the difficulty of rocket science. I wonder if its successor will fare so well.
Re:Final Tally (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh hey, thanks for updating the one I posted in a past article [slashdot.org]. I was wondering why it seemed so familiar.
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Oh hey, thanks for updating the one I posted in a past article.
You're welcome. I've updated it once before, and gave you credit for that one. You didn't notice, so I left it off this time.
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What alternatives are there?
Railguns (or any other sort of ground-based propulsion) physically cannot put something into orbit, and practically speaking, they can only provide a moderate boost. You'd still need at least a full rocket stage, possibly two, to actually get to orbit.
Ground-based laser propulsion might work, but it's never been tested at scale. And if there is a catastrophic failure, it will be on the ground-based components, not the vessel. In other words, the big explosion will be on the groun
Cause (Score:2, Informative)
Musk tweeted: There was an overpressure event in the upper stage liquid oxygen tank. Data suggests counterintuitive cause.
List of lost Cargo (Score:3)
There is a listing and pics of the lost cargo here. [spaceflight101.com]
The Dragon SpX-7 mission was to deliver supplies to the International Space Station and return cargo to Earth. Dragon remains the only visiting vehicle of ISS that can return a significant mass of cargo to the ground, aside from the crewed Soyuz spacecraft that can ferry a few dozen Kilograms of return items back to Earth along with its three crew members. The SpX-7 mission will carry 1,952 Kilograms of cargo to the Space Station and return 675 Kilograms to Earth at the conclusion of its five-week mission.
Crew Supplies - 676kg
Systems Hardware - 461kg
Science Cargo - 529kg
Computer Resources - 35kg
EVA Equipment - 166kg
External Payloads - 526kg
Interesting to note that part of the science cargo was the Meteor study. The Meteor study, going by the full name of ‘Meteor Composition Determination,’ was to be the first of its kind to be deployed in space, solely focused on the analysis of meteors entering Earth’s atmosphere and pin-pointing their composition through their optical emissions when burning up in the atmosphere. The original Meteor hardware was expected to arrive aboard the International Space Station in October 2014 on the Cygnus Orb-3 [spaceflight101.com] resupply craft that unfortunately was lost in a launch failure of its Antares launch vehicle just seconds after lifting off. Coincidence or someone really does not want this study to go ahead.
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I guess the Illuminati really don't want us to know what meteors are made of.
Re:List of lost Cargo (Score:4, Interesting)
I was thinking on starting off a conspiracy theory about a shady group sabotaging the ISS resupply missions. Alas I don't really have the imagination to come up with a suitably ridiculous hypothesis.
According to this list [wikipedia.org] they're going backwards:
* The first 51 missions were successful - Progress M
* The following 25 missions succeeded - Cygnus
* The next 4 missions were successful, followed by two successive failures (Progress M & Falcon 9)
On a serious note - the NASA press conference mentioned that the Progress M 3rd stage has been reverted to an older configuration, so the failures we're seeing are possibly due to multiple launch systems being continuously developed.
Musk blows out worlds biggest birthday candle (Score:4, Funny)
This guy has to do everything big
Press Conference is on now (12:50 EDT) (Score:2)
Video stream
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia... [nasa.gov]
This was a good outcome considering (Score:5, Insightful)
if you're gonna have a launch failure with total loss of all stages, at least this seems to be one of the better outcomes. First stage is very expensive and complex, fixing a major flaw there could take a long time and lots of money. But it looks like the first stage was working fine all the way to the (fiery) end, and it was a ruptured tank on the 2nd stage that caused the failure. Much better than the first stage exploding soon after liftoff.
First thought: headline!? (Score:4, Funny)
Musk has discovered the path to silicon-based spiritual enlightenment?
Perhaps OP meant ascent?
Too bad they couldn't test the escape system (Score:2)
Did this Dragon have SpaceX's new SuperDraco thrusters to allow emergency escape? It's disappointing that the rocket blew up, but it's really too bad they couldn't use this to demonstrate that their escape system works. That could have turned this from a big setback to a minor step forward in approving this thing to carry people.
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I read that the Dragon escape thrusters can be used anytime prior to orbit since they are built in and not jettisoned like the old escape tower rockets. Likely not installed in the cargo version but perhaps they should be precisely for this type of event. It would have been useful to save the Dragon capsule and the cargo.
Re:Too bad they couldn't test the escape system (Score:4, Informative)
Super Dracos are for escape in flight too, including in and past MaxQ. But they are on Crew Dragon, not Cargo Dragon. Cargo Dragon did not carry a crew and wasn't programmed to save itself.
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I wrote it fast. I was off the timing too. It assploded at 2:19. Not 2:40.
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Yeah, and you didn't manage to work Kardashians into it because, you know, every news items has something to do with Caitlin and the girls
WTF is up with a media cycle that cannot handle observation and analysis when there are conclusions to be jumped to and blame to be spread around
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Isn't funny that Musk's name isn't mentioned in the Summary or article? Every other time SpaceX is mentioned, his name is featured prominately.
That's because we were able to include "Microsoft" in the summary. Every time you can combine "Crash" or "Failure" or the like with "Microsoft", the /. crowd is satisfied.
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Who??
Re:Well, well, well. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, it is a bit like Musk's version of capitalism: nationalize the risks, privatize the rewards. What's the surprise?
Those private space insurance premiums should be skyrocketing....
/. will be a lot more forgiving than if this were a NASA failure.
I'm guessing
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Those private space insurance premiums should be skyrocketing....
Actually launch insurance is expensive enough that if you are doing a significant launch campaign, many companies will go without. If you were going to build, insure, and launch 3 satellites, it's actually cost effective to build/launch 4, and skip the insurance. That way, if one of them goes boom, you still get your three, and if one of them go boom, you wind up with an on-orbit spare.
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Re:Well, well, well. (Score:5, Informative)
Those private space insurance premiums should be skyrocketing....
I'm guessing /. will be a lot more forgiving than if this were a NASA failure.
The higher failure rate of SpaceX is expected. Setting aside Musk's marketing machine, it's understood that the medium-term goal here is to offer a higher-risk alternative (LEO prices below):
1. Western launch, traditional way: $4000-8000/pound (larger launches cheaper/pound). Low failure rate.
2. Non-western launch: $2000-3000/pound. Slightly higher failure rate.
3. SpaceX goal: $500-1000/pound. Slightly higher failure rate.
Long-term, SpaceX could achieve the same low failure rates through process refinement, but it's silly to expect that in the next decade.
Look, if your choices are $5000/pound with a 1% failure chance, or $1000/pound with a 5% failure rate, which do you pick? The rational answer depends entirely on the price to replace the payload, as two launches with a 5% failure rate have a very low chance both will fail. If your payload is "fuel" or "supplies" or something else cheaper than $5000/pound to replace, the added risk is completely the way to go.
Re:Well, well, well. (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe I don't understand your point? What's being "rationalized" here? Or are you unwilling to participate in honest discussion here? I rather suspect you're just trolling.
You seem to be saying that it's unfair that /.er's don't hold SpaceX to the same standards of NASA? Of course not, that was never the goal, never the point, and no reasonable person ever expected that. SpaceX is cheap - a goal of 10% of NASA's launch costs. There will of course be trade-offs. That's as expected, and it's still a good thing.
Re: Well, well, well. (Score:2, Informative)
The fuck are you talking about? This launch was undoubtedly, like all launches: insured. Also how the fuck do you figure they nationalize any risk? Development of the Falcon 9 has been solely on spacex, with nasa simply buying rocket launches at what is a competitive price.
Troll elsewhere
Re: Well, well, well. (Score:5, Insightful)
Do we want a nation of Ayn Rands merely writing about technology, or do we want to actually implement the technology? If the latter, government spending is essential because the market is way too shortsighted and prefers to take risks on balance sheets, with derivative instruments, rather than push the envelope of technological development.
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And this you write, after seeing what SpaceX has achieved as a private company, and what the publicly funded programmes has (not) achieved in the meantime?
Re: Well, well, well. (Score:5, Informative)
Wait, SpaceX is doing all this without those huge, multi-year injections of cash from the US government?
Probably they should publicise that more. Because you know, the actual records show them taking a colossal amount of money, straight from the US government, to do this. Without that money, SpaceX wouldn't exist or would still be doing cheap sub-orbital experiments.
Re: Well, well, well. (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, pretty much. SpaceX doesn't get a Federal budget, being as it's a privately owned, publicly traded company initially financed by Musk himself.
Wanna try again? Double or nothing? MAYBE some citable sources, this time?
"Privately funded, it had a vehicle before it got money from NASA, and while NASA’s space station resupply funds are a tremendous boost, SpaceX would have existed without it. [satellitetoday.com]"
Re: Well, well, well. (Score:4, Insightful)
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If the latter, government spending is essential because the market is way too shortsighted and prefers to take risks on balance sheets.
Because politicians are known for their long term thinking? All of the problems you state have to do with governments and central banking and have zero to do with free markets.
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citations absolutely required. Tesla and SpaceX were started by Musk with his own money.
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point ceded but mine stands: no public funding went in to development of either company. The only public money that's gone in was as remission for contracts. SpaceX can survive without NASA.
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Elon Musk would be launching from Baikonur Cosmodrome.
He still has that option.
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source?
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A mighty wind?
More like a methane-y gust
Aside from throwing a couple of names out there, what information do yo provide to make, much less back up any of your claims?
Or, is this some 'clever' scheme from Ted Cruz to push Pace-X into changing the x into a cross on all of their logos?
Re:A Bad Day for Elon Musk Fanbois (Score:5, Informative)
This is rewriting history. In december 2008 SpaceX was at the end of its tether. Musk himself wrote that they had virtually no money left in the bank when they finally got the NASA contract in the nick of time. So it was rather a close thing [bloomberg.com]:
In the meantime, at SpaceX, Musk and top executives had spent most of December in a state of fear, but on Dec. 23, 2008, SpaceX received a wonderful shock. The company won a $1.6 billion contract for 12 NASA resupply flights to the space station. Then the Tesla deal ended up closing successfully, on Christmas Eve, hours before Tesla would have gone bankrupt. Musk had just a few hundred thousand dollars left and could not have made payroll the next day.
Balls of steel but also tremendous luck.
Re:The good news (Score:5, Funny)
It still landed, just in more pieces than expected.
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And now we Floridians have a new reef to dive.
Re:Don't rule out sabotage (Score:5, Informative)
"The only alternatives to SpaceX are NASA's AtlasV and the Russian offerings. That's well known."
Well, apart from Arianespace (the Ariane V medium-lift and Vega small-capacity launcher), the Japanese H2-B launchers (one will fly a cargo resupply mission to the ISS in August), the low-cost Indian PSLVs, the Chinese Long March series of man-rated launchers etc. etc. That's well-known.
Saying that this launch failure has certainly put a crimp in SpaceX's plans to nuzzle up to the DoD/NSA funding teat.
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I thought there was something being set up for the RD-180 clone to be built on American soil?
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Maybe the Russians should launch a "Not a single cosmonaut lost since 1971!" marketing campaign.
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You are confusing "ascension" with "right ascension". Just plain "ascension" (not capitalized) is pretty much a synonym for "ascent".
A few dictionaries define "ascension" as an astronomical term referring to the rising of the star above the horizon -- in other words the increasing of altitude in the alt/azimuth coordinate system -- but this definition doesn't appear in lists of astronomical terms so either this usage is uncommon or obsolete.
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Ascension is generally more metaphorical than ascent.
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"You should quite smoking. It's not good for you."
He probably has.
It's hard to smoke after you disintegrate. Though, I am impressed he still was able to post to Slashdot.
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no such thing as an Hawaiian native, they're all nomadic Polynesian islanders.
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try again. SpaceX *had* a launch vehicle *before* they even approached NASA for contracts.
Re:When can we end the corporate experiment? (Score:4, Interesting)
"NASA" hasn't built a launch vehicle since the Saturn 1 in the early '60s. Everything since then has been built by private contractors, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, North American, etc. And only the first eight Saturn I's were built by government personnel (von Braun's group in Hunstville). The last two were built by Chrysler -- it was a big deal to pass the assembly to them (I think it may have been only the first stage at that time). As far as schedules are concerned there is no schedule pressure now for anyone like there was for NASA with Apollo in the '60s.
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Re: I normally gloat when Musk fails (Score:3, Insightful)