SpaceX launch their biggest rocket yet- fireworks guaranteed

[Marc v E]

Launch date is 20th of April, this Thursday at 8.28 am CT.

The starship and booster will liftoff for a test flight from the tower, with the booster returning and the ship doing a skydiver like maneuver to land savely. Both booster and starship will land in the sea for this launch iirc.

SpaceX

SpaceX designs, manufactures and launches advanced rockets and spacecraft.

www.spacex.com

 

[nerdstrike]

I was bummed by Monday's aborted prep.

This thing is a real statement in terms of complexity. The moar boosters principle of Kerbal Space Program made manifest! But does it have enough struts?

 

[Vini darko]

I'll be watching. Fingers crossed for no last minute scrubbs.

 

[Marc v E]

They're ready to go in 8 mins. So excited!!!

Starship Flight Test

Starship gave us quite a show during today’s first flight test of a fully integrated Starship and Super Heavy rocket from Starbase in Texas. At 8:33 a.m. CT...

www.youtube.com

 

[Marc v E]

Popcorn ready

 

[tomtoo]

Uhpss. No problem, next time.

 

[fpitas]

Up in smoke on 4/20. Very appropriate.

 

[blueone]

Unfortunately, the rocket exploded at 127,000 feet. An early report:

SpaceX Starship rocket launches in historic test but explodes mid-flight

Elon Musk's SpaceX launched its towering Starship rocket to space but suffered a mid-flight explosion.

www.cnbc.com

 

[fpitas]

"It's dead, Jim!"

 

[tomtoo]

Just a test that did not run well. But also not completly bad.

 

[nerdstrike]

So.. yeah... we just spin the thing the size of a frigate. Seems that struts won over the boosters this time.

 

[Vini darko]

That was fun. Haven't seen a rocket go wild like that before.

 

[Marc v E]

What a sight to see it launch. Almost like slowmotion to get that giant rocket moving. A few engines didn't seem to fire but it still cleared the platform.

From the article a few posts earlier I found:
"Before the mid-flight failure, Starship achieved one key milestone: the Super Heavy booster successfully separated from the rocket, flipped and began its return to Earth."

To me it looked like seperation didn't go as planned, but that may be because my view was through youtube on my phone.

 

[tomtoo]

What a sight to see it launch. Almost like slowmotion to get that giant rocket moving. A few engines didn't seem to fire but it still cleared the platform.

From the article above I found:
"Before the mid-flight failure, Starship achieved one key milestone: the Super Heavy booster successfully separated from the rocket, flipped and began its return to Earth."

To me it looked like seperation didn't go as planned, but that may be because my view was through youtube on my phone.

Same here thought it was a seperation failure. But whatdo we know?

 

[RayDunzl]

From somewhere over the equator between 22,232.8 and 22,240.8 miles up:

GOES-East - Sector view: Gulf of Mexico - GeoColor - NOAA / NESDIS / STAR

Near real-time publication of GOES-East and GOES-West images from NOAA/NESDIS/STAR

www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov

 

[tomtoo]

See it this way. This time the rocked came up. And just explodet a little to fast.
Thats not a dissaster. The rocket was just a little to happy.

 

[mhardy6647]

At least they didn't kill anybody.
Wonder how much environmental damage was done?

 

[Marc v E]

They carry mainly liquid oxygen and a smaller part methane. It looks bad but is probably insignificant compared to the gas that is flared of every day.
For future launches spaceX plans to generate the methane themselves from green energy.

The rest is mainly steel. The black part is ceramic tiles. And 1 battery pack in the nose cone.

 

[sarumbear]

The sensationalism of media is terrible.

SpaceX said this will be a launch test. Their goal is for the rocket to lift from the pad. They wanted to test the engines on load and rocket’s lift from the pad. Any success after that was “icing on the cake.” How was it reported?

“Rocket exploded before reaching the orbit!”

Even reputable sources like FT, NY Times, Guardian including the BBC reported along the same lines, as if it was a failure. It was a bloody success!

This is why we cannot, and should not, trust the media.

 

[Marc v E]

The sensationalism of media is terrible.

SpaceX said this will be a launch test. Their goal is for the rocket to lift from the pad. They wanted to test the engines on load and rocket’s lift from the pad. Any success after that was “icing on the cake.” How was it reported?

“Rocket exploded before reaching the orbit!”

Even reputable sources like FT, NY Times, Guardian including the BBC reported along the same lines, as if it was a failure. It was a bloody success!

This is why we cannot, and should not, trust the media.

Agreed. I too find the news on these rocket launches weird. Especially considering that SpaceX use iterative development, quite different from what the media was used to with usual rocket development. I sometimes get the impression many journalists simply don't get the thought proces behind this approach.