SpaceX Starship

Booster just did a nice long static fire after a small hiccup in the countdown right before ignition. If this went well, I believe the ship will be coming out to meet it soon for a test fit. Still looking good for flight toward the beginning of next week



Stoke Space teasing their first stage booster tank:



And Firefly showing off some of their composites

 
Void_of_Light said:
They should use that technology to build a submarine, what could go wrong?
Click to expand...

:lmao: Because we all know composites are so great in compression, I don't see a single fault in this plan

SpaceX dropped official footage of the static fire and stated it was full duration, good signs all around. I believe the Ship might even get transported out to the launch pad tonight, and stacked overnight?



Surprisingly, SpaceXAI (SpaceX + xAI merged) reached an agreement to lease spare compute capacity to Anthropic for Claude. Interesting pivot as the assumption was that they were going to use all that compute internally, but it seems like there's some chess being played as this is all going on during the OpenAI vs Elon trial



And more aerospace related but it involves Jared Isaacman, he and a few others have been quietly saying for years the final remaining F14 Tomcat airframes shouldn't be left to rot in scrapyards. Well...they're making progress on that front. Sounds like a few are going to be saved. I can't help but think he hopes to add one to his collection, or at the very least be directly involved with getting one or more airworthy





 
Rocket Lab released some pretty cool new media

Here's their in-work landing barge for the upcoming Neutron rocket:



Stage separation test for the Neutron:



Archimedes engine testing for Neutron:





And they partnered with Anduril, and separately with Rayethon for military hypersonic testing, and space based interceptors

 
Starship launch date has slipped a bit, the 15th is now the earliest opportunity. After the static fire they had to start some service work on the chopsticks, it seems like they might have lost a day or two there as they're still working on it



Also oddly joined by a reentry NOTAM for the Gulf of America...all the previous flights had the Ship landing in the Indian Ocean. Are they going to try to full orbit this thing and bring it down after a full lap around the world? Ballsy on the first flight of V3, if that's actually what this implies

 
AgitatedPancake said:
Starship launch date has slipped a bit, the 15th is now the earliest opportunity. After the static fire they had to start some service work on the chopsticks, it seems like they might have lost a day or two there as they're still working on it



Also oddly joined by a reentry NOTAM for the Gulf of America...all the previous flights had the Ship landing in the Indian Ocean. Are they going to try to full orbit this thing and bring it down after a full lap around the world? Ballsy on the first flight of V3, if that's actually what this implies

Click to expand...

Full orbit flight would be sweet!
 
Yeah full orbit would be fawkin cool as hell, and finally satisfy the "well technically..." crowd that wasn't satisfied calling the other flights orbital because they shut the engines off a second or two early to ensure it would reenter no matter what, even if they lost control :laughing:. That's the big commitment about going fully orbital. If you burn that final couple seconds to go fully orbital, you cross the threshold of a fully predictable ballistic reentry, into the zone where you need the engines to work to deorbit in a planned location. As soon as you reach full orbit, if you're engines fail you, you're reentering wherever the very slight atmospheric drag dictates, and that's a super broad window

I agree on the names, I'm glad things have become a bit whimsy in the spaceflight world, even at the top levels. When I was growing up, the concepts of rocket scientists and astronauts were such a rigid by-the-book concept, it was less relatable. But these days, humor and personality actually feel like they exist in the industry


Blue origin showed off how they plan to deploy the VIPER rover on the Moon, when the Mk1 lands later this year. The VIPER lander actually insanely lost funding AFTER being completed, when it was going through final testing and got cancelled for a bit. Then they were able to revisit it and get it a ride on Blue Origins vehicle (the dates on the below are separated by years)





 
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Live feed of the first V3 full stack Wet Dress Rehearsal, they should begin loading propellant soon. Nothing exciting planned, but a full fuel load is cool either way



And SpaceX dropped some cool media on the stack





Also cool side by side of the previous V2s and the new V3. It's super clean and elegant in comparison

 
IMG_2845.jpeg
 
The next Starship flight has been bumped, now NET the 19th



They got destacked overnight



Also this is pretty cool, this is SpaceX's new barge that they will be using for transporting Starships between Texas and Florida (and possibly other states, like if that Louisiana thing happens). It's called You'll Thank Me Later



 
CDA 455 II said:
On an unrelated topic;
When does all the space junk orbiting Earth become a danger issue?
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The stuff at high orbits is the scary stuff, that stuff can linger for hundreds of years because there's not enough drag to bring it back down into the atmosphere reasonably. Low orbit stuff like Starlinks are cool, because they're catching just enough wind resistance that if one or more dies while on orbit, they deorbit naturally due to drag in just months up to a couple years.

But the Kessler syndrome is an always-real possibility, and there have been some events in the past that show the risk, like satellite explosions, collisions and anti-satellite missile tests that have sent clouds of shrapnel orbiting around the earth for extended periods of time. The more of that shrapnel there is, the more risk that other satellites get taken out and make more shrapnel until it becomes a recursive problem
 
The exponential nature of Kessler syndrome is a real problem. The presence of manned spaceflight beyond low orbit needs to put as much, if not more, priority on space cleanliness like bringing dead satellites back as it does on human presence on the lunar and martian surfaces.

A huge problem is how orbit can start to shift with just a slight bump. Earth orbit planning software has options to account for things like Mount Everest and ore deposits. There are stable orbits that do not cross the equator. The Starlink constellation is a great example. A narrow stream of satellites at launch spreads out into completely different orbits with a tiny amount of delta V.
 
I agree, I think we will start doing better active cleanup as spaceflight gets cheaper and cheaper over the next decade. Hopefully that cleanup is proactive, and isn't spurred by a significant incident

SpaceX dropped the official details on the upcoming Flight 12 of Starship, currently set for the 19th. Interesting note, they expect the flight to hit MaxQ (max aerodynamic pressure) a whole 15 seconds faster than previous flights - this thing should fly off the pad compared to previous flights

Here's the link for details on how they plan Flight 12 to go:
SpaceX

And here's a new deeper dive into the differences on these new V3 vehicles:
SpaceX

 
AgitatedPancake said:
I agree, I think we will start doing better active cleanup as spaceflight gets cheaper and cheaper over the next decade. Hopefully that cleanup is proactive, and isn't spurred by a significant incident
Click to expand...
but how do you actually clean up small items in orbit?

old boosters, or decommissioned satellites, I can see the possibility to de-orbit them.
but a majority by numbers is very small items, that can do immense damage.

kind of like cleaning micro plastics from the ocean
only real way is to not put them there to begin with
 
Treefrog said:
I wonder if we will see a rule like they have for Mount Everest for a few years. No permission to go up granted unless you bring a certain amount of trash back down with you.
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I do think there is a rule now, where they must have a de-orbit plan before a satellite is launched?
 
Treefrog said:
I wonder if we will see a rule like they have for Mount Everest for a few years. No permission to go up granted unless you bring a certain amount of trash back down with you.
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Some sort of system like that might be a good way to go about it. Even if it just came down to tonnage up vs tonnage down per yet. If they want to put up say 1,000 tons of satellites in a year, maybe they have to bring down 10 tons, or 100 tons. Though maybe tonnage isn't the best indicator because the small bits are just as deadly. Hmm.

WLDWUN said:
but how do you actually clean up small items in orbit?

old boosters, or decommissioned satellites, I can see the possibility to de-orbit them.
but a majority by numbers is very small items, that can do immense damage.

kind of like cleaning micro plastics from the ocean
only real way is to not put them there to begin with
Click to expand...

That's the big question I don't think we have solved yet. A huge (kilometer) aerogel or kevlar-ish catching mitt might work. Even if the debris passed clean through it, as long as it removed enough energy to get it to deorbit. Or I think there's a possibility in lasers for small stuff, but they'd have to be on a vehicle in close-ish proximity. Not necessarily vaporizing anything, just imparting enough energy to slow the debris down enough to deorbit naturally
 
AgitatedPancake said:
Some sort of system like that might be a good way to go about it. Even if it just came down to tonnage up vs tonnage down per yet. If they want to put up say 1,000 tons of satellites in a year, maybe they have to bring down 10 tons, or 100 tons. Though maybe tonnage isn't the best indicator because the small bits are just as deadly. Hmm.



That's the big question I don't think we have solved yet. A huge (kilometer) aerogel or kevlar-ish catching mitt might work. Even if the debris passed clean through it, as long as it removed enough energy to get it to deorbit. Or I think there's a possibility in lasers for small stuff, but they'd have to be on a vehicle in close-ish proximity. Not necessarily vaporizing anything, just imparting enough energy to slow the debris down enough to deorbit naturally
Click to expand...
There was a TV show about a guy who using scrap NASA parts to go up and scavenge the gold
 
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