Starship alert!
FYI, spacex is ready for the first test flight possibly Apr 17
dont miss it
33 engines on booster , larger thrust than Saturn V
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That thing with its squid-like fin tabs on the nose looks a lot like my King Kraken!
Someone should add some purple color to it.
Yeppers, unless it explodes on the pad, Liftoff is 8am tomorrow. 90 minute flight to Hawaii. Booster will crash into the ocean 32km into the gulf, while the starship will achieve a suborbital trajectory that takes it mostly around the globe to splashdown near Hawaii. Assuming everything goes right of course. This rocket has had it's pieces tested, but the whole system has never been flown, so anything could go wrong. If things do go well, it will be the most powerful rocket ever launched in human history.
Their rocket looks like an unfinished Kraken.
My King Kraken flies for a lot cheaper too!
😎
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April 20!!
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A test flight occurred Apr 20
there was a failure to ignite the starship
liftoff was impressive
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Failure to ignite. We've all been there!
They said the flight was a success since it cleared the tower. I guess they weren't counting on anything else. Remind me to NOT buy a ticket on that ride!
I plan to visit boca chica spacex in july
Elon Musk Starship Talk
April 29, 2023 by Michael Sheetz | @SpaceXChat
A summary of Musk's Twitter Space (29/4) provided by Michael Sheetz in this Twitter thread.
Musk: "The outcome was roughly in what I expected, and maybe slightly exceeding my expectations, but roughly what I expected, which is that we would get clear of the pad."
"I'm glad to report that the pad damage is actually quite small" and should "be repaired quickly."
"The vehicle's structural margins appear to be better than we expected, as we can tell from the vehicle actually doing somersaults towards the end and still staying intact."
From a "pad standpoint, we are probably ready to launch in 6 to 8 weeks.'
"The longest item on that is probably requalification of the flight termination system ... it took way too long to rupture the tanks."
Time for AFTS to kick in "was pretty long," about "40 seconds-ish."
"There were 3 engines that we chose not to start," so that's why Super Heavy booster lifted off with 30 engines, "which is the minimum number of engines."
The 3 engines "didn't explode," but just were not "healthy enough to bring them to full thrust so they were shut down"
At T+27 seconds, SpaceX lost communications due to "some kind of energy event." And "some kind of explosion happened to knock out the heat shields of engines 17, 18, 19, or 20."
"Rocket kept going through T+62 seconds" with the engines continuing to run. Lost thrust vector control at T+85 seconds.
Generated a "rock tornado" under Super Heavy during liftoff, but SpaceX does not "see evidence that the rock tornado actually damaged engines or heat shields in a material way." May have happened, but "we have not seen evidence of that."
"Really just needed to fly this vehicle and then move on to the much improved booster."
"Debris was really just basically sand and rock so it's not toxic at all ... it's just like a sandstorm
