SpaceX Starship

ApeEater said:
Falcon heavy is different than the starship booster. It’s had several successful commercial missions.
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Doesnt alter what I said, none of the private ventures have successfully gone to moon and back...that and lifting a payload to orbit isnt the same as actually orbiting earth.
 
DavidVanVorous said:
Doesnt alter what I said, none of the private ventures have successfully gone to moon and back...that and lifting a payload to orbit isnt the same as actually orbiting earth.
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True they hadn’t been hired for any missions that go to the moon and return until the Artemis lander was selected, and we should see those test landings and returns in the next 2 years.

What do you mean about lifting to orbit not actually orbiting earth?
 
DavidVanVorous said:
Doesnt alter what I said, none of the private ventures have successfully gone to moon and back...that and lifting a payload to orbit isnt the same as actually orbiting earth.
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What you had said had zero relevance to what you had quoted. The post you originally quoted was merely stating that a Falcon Heavy can deliver cargo to the moon, and the conversation was about delivering cargo on a one way path. Falcon Heavy has sent cargo to Mars which means it can certainly do the moon. Whether anything is in orbit or a private venture or can return from the moon has nothing to do with Falcon Heavy flying a lander to the moon.

As for your comment about something being in orbit not considered orbiting, you're obviously playing by a completely different semantics playbook than everyone else.
 
DavidVanVorous said:
Thats the "theory" but they have yet to achieve a full earth orbit much less a moon visit and return. Then too none of the "private" ventures have managed the moon visit and return yet.
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By choice though, not because of inability. Any of the successful starship flights could easily have put payload into orbit. They choose not to and to keep them on a sub-orbital trajectory to ensure that any failures don't result in unexpected landing locations.
 
sdmuleman said:
By choice though, not because of inability. Any of the successful starship flights could easily have put payload into orbit. They choose not to and to keep them on a sub-orbital trajectory to ensure that any failures don't result in unexpected landing locations.
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That comment just reinforced what I said by agreeing they haven't orbited yet. It also doesn't prove they have the ability to orbit either, thats speculation on your part...
 
babylonbee.com

Man Watching Blue Origin Explode Just Glad To Know Wife's Amazon Purchases Could Finance This

COLUMBIA, SC — Watching in awe as Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket exploded in spectacular fashion, local man Dennis Rogers was glad to finally see what his wife's Amazon purchases had funded.
babylonbee.com babylonbee.com

Man Watching Blue Origin Explode Just Glad To Know Wife's Amazon Purchases Could Finance This​

Family·May 30, 2026 · BabylonBee.com
Image for article: Man Watching Blue Origin Explode Just Glad To Know Wife's Amazon Purchases Could Finance This





COLUMBIA, SC — Watching in awe as Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket exploded in spectacular fashion, local man Dennis Rogers was glad to finally see what his wife's Amazon purchases had funded.

As plumes of black smoke billowed into the air, Rogers marveled at what all of those boxes on the porch had finally added up to.

"Wow. That… was a lot of handheld slushie makers that just went up in flames," said Rogers. "All of that moisturizing cream - boom! Pretty epic. It's nice to really have a clear visual of where our money went. Hey, babe! Come check out this explosion you paid for."

Husbands across the nation joined Rogers in surveying the massive launch pad detonation, watching as $150 million worth of their wives' Amazon acquisitions went up in a glorious fireball. "We all made this happen, together," said Rogers, sharing the video with his friend Brad. "It's kind of cool thinking about how all our wives worked together to put a bunch of fuel in a rocket and blow it up. It's a real communal accomplishment."

At publishing time, Rogers' wife had gotten back to work helping to contribute to the next explosive catastrophe.
 
DavidVanVorous said:
That comment just reinforced what I said by agreeing they haven't orbited yet. It also doesn't prove they have the ability to orbit either, thats speculation on your part...
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Do you understand how rocket launches work? The first stage of any rocket system never reaches orbits. Until Space-X, the first stage just fell back to earth when it consumed its fuel. The second stage of Falcon9 and Falcon heavy have certainly orbited earth. Space-X usually de-orbits them by relighting the engine to lower the orbit so they land in the ocean. When they large comm sats to geo transfer orbit, the second stage remains in orbit for several months before it re-enters.
 
Damn, they're looking at it realistically, and worst case scenario the pad may not be back online until 2028

Blue Origin launchpad damaged in rocket explosion may not be restored until 2028, NASA's Isaacman says

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman on Monday told CNBC that it will “take some serious time” to restore the launchpad damaged last week by a Blue Origin rocket explosion.

Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin was conducting a hot-fire test of its massive New Glenn rocket on Thursday at a Space Force launch facility in Cape Canaveral, Florida, when the rocket erupted into a fireball. Bezos confirmed that all Blue Origin personnel were safe following the incident, and pledged to rebuild, while calling it a “very rough day.”




A 2028 timeframe is “within the realm” of a possible launchpad recovery, Isaacman said in an interview at CNBC’s CEO Council Summit.

“We’re all getting organized generally around the idea that we certainly want to see Blue Origin be very successful,” Isaacman said. “So recovering, getting the pad recovered, providing subject matter expertise, root cause analysis for sure. Let’s figure out what’s broken, and then we got to keep moving forward.”

Isaacman, Bezos and Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp toured the launchpad and addressed the space startup’s employees on Friday. Limp wrote in a Saturday post on X that Blue Origin has since regained some access to launchpad and developed a plan for rebuilding.

NASA has several contracts with Blue Origin as part of the space agency’s Artemis program, an effort to return American astronauts to the Moon’s surface by 2028. It tapped Blue Origin to launch an uncrewed Blue Moon lander, known as MK1, atop New Glenn later this year.

Getting the lander to the moon will require a rocket that can carry a significant amount of mass, Isaacman said. That will likely put NASA in “Falcon Heavy land,” he said, referring to the super heavy-lift rocket developed by Elon Musk’s SpaceX.




“In terms of heavy lift, you know, real heavy lift, you’ve got SpaceX and Blue Origin, and obviously one of them is down a pad right now,” Isaacman said.

New Glenn was designed by Blue Origin to compete with SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, along with United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan heavy-lift rocket.

Blue Origin only has one New Glenn launchpad, making Thursday’s explosion an especially devastating mishap. It plans to operate a New Glenn launchpad out of Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, but that pad remains in development.

“We’ve got a lot of data, in fact, it was one of the first things my team made available, is, hey, across history of human space flight, of every launch pad we’ve built, every launch pad we ever had to rebuild, here’s the timelines,” Isaacman said. “Even if you’re moving at, you know, a pretty quick pace, that’s going to take some serious time.”

The incident also impacts Blue Origin’s other customers, including Amazon. Blue Origin was set to ferry 48 satellites for Amazon’s nascent Leo internet-from-space venture this week, as part of several upcoming missions.

Amazon, which Bezos founded in 1994, has a pending deadline by the Federal Communications Commission to deploy about half of its constellation by next month. It’s also working to bring its Leo service online for commercial customers later this year, which aims to compete with SpaceX’s Starlink.

AST SpaceMobile, which is building a direct-to-device satellite system, also relies on Blue Origin for some rocket launches. The stock closed down more than 6% on Monday, after falling almost 17% on Friday.
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One other part of it is super interesting: "Getting the lander to the moon will require a rocket that can carry a significant amount of mass, Isaacman said. That will likely put NASA in “Falcon Heavy land,” he said, referring to the super heavy-lift rocket developed by Elon Musk’s SpaceX."

I genuinely thought that lander was too large for the Falcon's 5 meter payload fairing, unless he's just talking in broad strokes about the lift capacity required. If it would theoretically fit though, I misspoke earlier and that's my bad
 
AgitatedPancake said:
Damn, they're looking at it realistically, and worst case scenario the pad may not be back online until 2028

Blue Origin launchpad damaged in rocket explosion may not be restored until 2028, NASA's Isaacman says



One other part of it is super interesting: "Getting the lander to the moon will require a rocket that can carry a significant amount of mass, Isaacman said. That will likely put NASA in “Falcon Heavy land,” he said, referring to the super heavy-lift rocket developed by Elon Musk’s SpaceX."

I genuinely thought that lander was too large for the Falcon's 5 meter payload fairing, unless he's just talking in broad strokes about the lift capacity required. If it would theoretically fit though, I misspoke earlier and that's my bad
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Even 2028 sounds optimistic imo.

Getting Falcon Heavy to work is just money, worst case "just" make a new fairing. I thought I saw something recently (hell maybe it was on here) how Rocket Lab or Firefly or one of the small rockets had a custom fairing for a specific customer that was some funky shape to get the spacecraft to fit.

Every launch has a bunch of custom **** to adapt to the rocket anyway, can't imagine the fairing is that much of a hurdle to change.
 
snivilous said:
Even 2028 sounds optimistic imo.

Getting Falcon Heavy to work is just money, worst case "just" make a new fairing. I thought I saw something recently (hell maybe it was on here) how Rocket Lab or Firefly or one of the small rockets had a custom fairing for a specific customer that was some funky shape to get the spacecraft to fit.

Every launch has a bunch of custom **** to adapt to the rocket anyway, can't imagine the fairing is that much of a hurdle to change.
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Man I hope they're able to pull off some miracles.

Yep good memory that was probably Rocket Lab, they've had to add bumps to a handful of the fairings they've launched to fit some bigger sats. Though they are just modifying their standard fairings there. The tooling required for a full new diameter composite fairing is...well ain't nothin but money and time lol

 
Ok their ears must have been burning :laughing: . This sounds closer to the best-case side of things, along with an aspirational goal to be ready again by the end of the year. I would be completely blown away if they managed to pull that off, I'm rooting for 'em



And clarification from Isaacman on the 2028 statement - that was just regarding the critical missions themselves and not the rocket/pad

 
AgitatedPancake said:
Damn, they're looking at it realistically, and worst case scenario the pad may not be back online until 2028

Blue Origin launchpad damaged in rocket explosion may not be restored until 2028, NASA's Isaacman says



One other part of it is super interesting: "Getting the lander to the moon will require a rocket that can carry a significant amount of mass, Isaacman said. That will likely put NASA in “Falcon Heavy land,” he said, referring to the super heavy-lift rocket developed by Elon Musk’s SpaceX."

I genuinely thought that lander was too large for the Falcon's 5 meter payload fairing, unless he's just talking in broad strokes about the lift capacity required. If it would theoretically fit though, I misspoke earlier and that's my bad
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I still don't see how 16 feet is too small for a lunar lander. It fit the roadster with room to spare, are they planning on launching a repurposed greyhound?
 
Void_of_Light said:
I still don't see how 16 feet is too small for a lunar lander. It fit the roadster with room to spare, are they planning on launching a repurposed greyhound?
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Cuz they ****ing huge now-a-days. gots to have all them fancy electronics, and airbags and exploding seatbelts n ****.

ai says:
1780434719557.png
 
Void_of_Light said:
I still don't see how 16 feet is too small for a lunar lander. It fit the roadster with room to spare, are they planning on launching a repurposed greyhound?
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I'm doubting what I believed at this point, not confident either way. It does seem like hte main body is ~3.1 meters as Sceep's post noted, but then the landing legs are apparently fixed and non-retractable, and spread out beyond that. Though it does seem more possible than I initially thought. SpaceX would need to figure out how to fill it with liquid hydrogen at their launch pads (only set up for lox and kerosene), but that is surmountable.

ApeEater said:
170’ tall?!?!?!
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Starship is a skyscraper :laughing: . Rough approximation against the Apollo and the Blue Origin Mk2 (which is much bigger than the Mk1 being discussed here) for flight in the next year or so)



 
Pocahontas said:
If I’m remembering correctly all of the previous Chinese attempts suffered rapid unscheduled disassembly, one on the pad and one shortly after liftoff.
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from the article...had you read it. :flipoff2:

China’s first two attempts to recover heavy boosters failed in December. First, a company named LandSpace, part of China’s recent wave of quasi-commercial launch providers, debuted its Zhuque 3 rocket on December 2. The launch was successful, but the booster crashed near its landing zone downrange from its launch site in the Gobi Desert of northwestern China. Less than three weeks later, a somewhat less powerful rocket named the Long March 12A had a similar result on its first test flight. The Long March 12A is a product of the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology, part of China’s legacy government-owned space industry.
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In early April, another relative newcomer to China’s launch sector launched its new medium-class Tianlong 3 rocket. The 7-year-old firm behind the Tianlong 3, named Space Pioneer, said the rocket failed to reach orbit, an outcome not uncommon for brand-new launch vehicles. Tianlong 3’s first stage booster is designed for recovery and reuse, but a landing attempt will have to wait until a future flight.
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