It's weird to see such a nice, clean rocket. :)

Less clean now. I feel better.

Whoa!! Amazing video of the landing.

Definitely the best landing video I've seen.

Separation video was wild too.

Mildly interesting news:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Jeff Bezos was talking longingly about going into space more than five years ago. Next month, he will finally get his chance.<a href="https://t.co/XdTTYOji9n">https://t.co/XdTTYOji9n</a></p>&mdash; Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) <a href="https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1401895245604917254?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 7, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Despite my general lack of enthusiasm for Blue Origin's style, it's nice that they're finally going to fly humans, and having Bezos himself on board will generate plenty of discussion. Maybe someday they'll actually be relevant in the broader landscape of space exploration.

lol @ the attempt to compare New Shepard to the Soyuz.

Good for Bezos. I wonder if the timing has anything to do with his resignation.

I hope they perfect these systems and get the price down so I can get into space before I die.

I personally think Virgin Galactic @ $200K is reasonable at this time. Certainly as an opening rate.

Got a few dozen million laying around?

Blue Origin auctions seat on first spaceflight with Jeff Bezos for $28 million

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/12/jeff...8-million.html

T-60:00

SpaceX
Falcon 9 Block 5 | GPS III-5
JRTI
Thu Jun 17, 2021 16:09 UTC
SLC-40, Cape Canaveral SFS, Florida, USA

T-15:00 Stream is live:

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That landing looked a little iffy for a while...

I didn't catch it live, but aside from being a little off center, the landing looked OK to me. What am I missing?

The crowd reaction was a little odd, too.

Check out T+8:00 and on. The last landing, the drone ship was right under the first stage after the landing burn. On this one, the drone ship is way off to the left.

It's my understanding they all come in angled like that in case of an issue so it continues on into the ocean and doesn't damage the boat. We watched that happen once and it was explained then by Musk.

T+7:24 for comparison. I suppose it wasn't as far off after all...

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QXf9mRWbXDM" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Probably just differences in the launch profile. ISS-bound launches are relatively low energy (remember that they used to even bring them back to land), while GEO launches push the limits of what the F9 can deliver.

Pretty crazy how fast they're launching this year. Obviously Starlink is the big driver, but still amazing that they're keeping up the pace.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Assuming the final upper stage burn goes well later today, SpaceX will have completed 19 Falcon 9 missions so far this year.<br><br>To put this cadence into perspective, SpaceX successfully completed 19 Falcon 9 missions from 2010 through 2015, a period of six years.</p>&mdash; Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) <a href="https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1405563392979505154?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 17, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

What's going on with Starship testing? Awfully quiet since SN15.

Long, but really excellent review of Starship testing to date and moving forward (speculative).


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Sorry if Max-Q...

Falcon Heavy’s first national security launch slips to October

https://spaceflightnow.com/2021/05/2...ps-to-october/

The next launch of a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket has been delayed from July to October to await the readiness of its U.S. military payload, and the following Falcon Heavy flight has been rescheduled from late this year to some time in 2022, military officials said.

Col. Robert Bongiovi, head of the launch enterprise at the Space Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center, said Wednesday the USSF-44 and USSF-52 missions — both carrying U.S. military satellites — have been pushed back from their previous target launch dates in July and October.

The missions are the first two launches of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rockets to carry the military’s highest-priority national security payloads. The most recent Falcon Heavy launch in June 2019 was also for the U.S. military, but it carried a cluster of lower-priority experimental satellites into orbit.

The USSF-44 mission has moved from a launch date in July to October to “accommodate payload readiness,” according to Col. Douglas Pentecost, deputy director of SMC’s launch enterprise. The following mission, USSF-52, was previously scheduled for launch in October of this year, but has now been moved into 2022 “based on launch manifest priorities,” Pentecost said in a statement released to Spaceflight Now.

The Falcon Heavy missions are expected to be the fourth and fifth flights of SpaceX’s triple-core heavy-lifter. Both launches will take off from pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The Falcon Heavy will deliver multiple military payloads to a high-altitude geosynchronous orbit on the USSF-44 mission. The rocket’s upper stage will fire several times to place the satellites into position more than 22,000 miles above the equator.

The upper stage flight profile will include a coast lasting more than five hours between burns, making the USSF-44 mission one of SpaceX’s most demanding launches yet.

On the most recent Falcon Heavy mission, which lifted off in June 2019, the rocket’s upper stage completed four burns over three-and-a-half hours on a demonstration flight sponsored by the Air Force. The STP-2 launch in 2019 served as a pathfinder for the long-duration USSF-44 mission.

The complex orbital maneuvers during the STP-2 mission were required to place 24 satellite payloads into three distinct orbits. They also exercised the capabilities of the Falcon Heavy and its Merlin upper stage engine before the military entrusts the launcher with more critical, and more expensive, operational national security payloads on future flights, such as the USSF-44 mission.

SpaceX won a contract for the USSF-44 launch in February 2019. In the request for proposals for the USSF-44 launch, the military told prospective launch providers to assume the combined mass of two payloads assigned to the mission is less than 8,200 pounds, or about 3.7 metric tons.

The Space Force hasn’t said whether there are still two satellites booked on the USSF-44 mission, or if officials added more secondary payloads since the 2019 contract award. One of the spacecraft on the USSF-44 launch is a microsatellite named TETRA 1 built by Millennium Space Systems, a subsidiary of Boeing headquartered in El Segundo, California.

Military officials said in a statement the TETRA 1 satellite was created to “prototype missions and tactics, techniques and procedures in and around geosynchronous Earth orbit.”

The Space Force has not disclosed any payloads on the USSF-52 launch next year, but military officials wrote in a draft contract solicitation that the mission would deliver a heavy payload to a geostationary transfer orbit, an elongated path around Earth used as a drop-off point for many satellites heading to a circular geosynchronous orbit.

SpaceX has launched three Falcon Heavy rocket missions to date, all successfully. The company has at least eight confirmed Falcon Heavy missions in its backlog, including the USSF-44 and USSF-52 missions for the Space Force, and launches of a Viasat broadband communications satellite and NASA’s Psyche asteroid explorer, both in 2022.

Astrobotic announced in April that a Falcon Heavy rocket will launch its Griffin lander to the moon in 2023 on a mission to deliver a water-scouting NASA rover to the lunar south pole.

A single Falcon Heavy will also launch the first two elements of NASA’s Gateway lunar space station in 2024, and two Falcon Heavy flights will boost Dragon XL cargo missions to the Gateway later in the 2020s.

The Falcon Heavy is made up of three modified Falcon 9 first stage boosters connected together in a triple-core configuration. The rocket’s 27 Merlin main engines produce some 5.1 million pounds of thrust at liftoff, more than any other currently operational rocket.

All of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy missions currently under contract will take off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where the company plans to construct a vertical integration building and shelter to accommodate future Falcon Heavy payloads.

SpaceX will use three newly-manufactured boosters for the USSF-44 mission, and the challenging launch profile will leave no leftover propellant to recover the center core of the Falcon Heavy, according to the Space Force. The core stage will be expended on the launch, while the rocket’s two side boosters will be recovered on two SpaceX drone ships positioned downrange east of Cape Canaveral.

The Falcon Heavy will get more U.S. military launch contracts in the coming years.

The Space Force last year announced multibillion-dollar contracts to fly the military’s most critical national security payloads on United Launch Alliance Vulcan Centaur rockets and SpaceX Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launchers through 2027.

Space News reported Thursday that the Space Force and ULA have agreed to move the first military mission assigned to a Vulcan Centaur rocket to an Atlas 5 rocket. That mission, designated USSF-51, is scheduled to launch in 2022.

The Vulcan Centaur’s first national security launch is now scheduled for early 2023 with the USSF-106 mission, Bongiovi said Wednesday. That flight will follow two certification launches of the Vulcan Centaur rocket carrying commercial payloads.

https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-sta...l-launch-prep/

SpaceX has moved its newest finished Starship straight from its Boca Chica, Texas factory to a nearby ‘rocket garden,’ all but guaranteeing an early retirement.

Built as the first of several planned backups to Starship SN15, which debuted a number of significant upgrades in April and May, it appears that Starship serial number 16 (SN16) has been retired to a display stand after its only sibling became the first full-size prototype to successfully survive a launch and landing on May 5th. SN16 actually reached its full height before SN15 lifted off and was more or less complete by May 10th. Since then, the prototype has remaining more or less untouched, seemingly waiting for SpaceX to decide its fate in lieu of Starship SN15’s major success.

Ultimately, with SN16 now sitting side by side with SN15 at what will likely become a sort of open-air SpaceX museum, it appears that the company has made up its mind.

Bizarre. My post earlier is in the thread twice, but it's literally the same post ID in the database. If I delete one of them, it deletes them both. Oh well. Guess I'll leave it.

Haven't been paying much attention lately, but really seems like we won't be seeing anymore solo Starship test flights. Efforts now seem to be on full stack testing. Latest RGV video shows the landing pad covered with parts for finishing the launch tower. Combined with the SN-15 through SN-19 end I'm guessing we don't see another launch until the full stack is ready to go. I thought we'd see at least one or two BN-x test flights, but maybe not.


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Falcon 9 Block 5 | Transporter 2
LZ-1
Tue Jun 29, 2021 1:56 EDT
SLC-40, Cape Canaveral SFS, Florida, USA

Did it get moved up? Everything I saw had the window opening at 2:56 EDT.

Sorry, my error.

T-55:00

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RTLS. Haven't had one of those in a while.

Yep. I'm hoping that they'll have a few drones up and flying.

Stream is live. Eighth flight of the first stage. Incredible.

Range hold. Haven't had one of those in a while either.

Some doofus on a boat?

And scrubbed. Damn you, random airplane(?)!

A little odd that they went straight to a scrub though.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">SpaceX says the launch is scrubbed for today, even though there’s a window that runs for nearly an hour.</p>&mdash; Jeff Foust (@jeff_foust) <a href="https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1409949586022617090?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 29, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Unfortunately, launch is called off for today, as an aircraft entered the “keep out zone”, which is unreasonably gigantic. <br><br>There is simply no way that humanity can become a spacefaring civilization without major regulatory reform. The current regulatory system is broken.</p>&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1409951549988782087?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 29, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

How big is the no fly zone? Didn't the last RUD on Starship spread like 6 miles?

Sent from my Pixel 4 using Tapatalk

UAP ????

Based on the map, it looks like maybe 60-75 miles from north to south.

As for Starship, the exclusion zone around the launch site itself was only 5 miles as I recall, and debris didn't get anywhere near that far out.

Let's try that again...

Falcon 9 Block 5 | Transporter 2
LZ-1
Wed Jun 30, 2021 2:56 EDT
SLC-40, Cape Canaveral SFS, Florida, USA

Bumped back ~30 minutes.

No bad helicopters today - she's off!

Great landing shots.

It's ridiculous how easy those landings look these days. I've missed having descent video.

It moved. Not going to lie and no shame.

This is one of the coolest shots they've ever gotten. Audio is fantastic as well.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Tracking footage of Falcon 9 landing on LZ-1 <a href="https://t.co/uCR2ZuDSG7">pic.twitter.com/uCR2ZuDSG7</a></p>— SpaceX (@SpaceX) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1410392725996904448?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

That was freaking awesome! It is amazing that after so many of these they can still impress.

That shit is crazy. I'm surprised there isn't a conspiracy theory claiming this is all CGI.

I knew that it comes in at quite an angle, but it looks like damn close to perpendicular to the ground!

Wow! That is so cool. They've got that down pat.

There's a big ass booster on a test stand.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Blink and you would have missed it! Very fast lift operations. Booster 3 is nearly on the stand.<a href="https://t.co/u2AORfE3BT">https://t.co/u2AORfE3BT</a> <a href="https://t.co/rxZv4Ln047">pic.twitter.com/rxZv4Ln047</a></p>&mdash; Michael Baylor (@nextspaceflight) <a href="https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1410731000418607114?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

The people in Optics are getting good at this.

Wow...

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Super Heavy on road &amp; 7th Tower segment added <a href="https://t.co/SJIHA3BLhL">pic.twitter.com/SJIHA3BLhL</a></p>&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1410670645948653568?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MarsHelicopter?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#MarsHelicopter</a> pushes its Red Planet limits. ��<br>The rotorcraft completed its 9th and most challenging flight yet, flying for 166.4 seconds at a speed of 5 m/s. Take a look at this shot of Ingenuity’s shadow captured with its navigation camera. <a href="https://t.co/TNCdXWcKWE">https://t.co/TNCdXWcKWE</a> <a href="https://t.co/zUIbrr7Qw9">pic.twitter.com/zUIbrr7Qw9</a></p>&mdash; NASA JPL (@NASAJPL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NASAJPL/status/1412092497552019458?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 5, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Good article on the ULA/BO marriage. Just in general, I'm a big fan of Eric Berger. Give him a follow for good space content.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Blue Origin and ULA have been partners for nearly seven years now, but the marriage is showing signs of fraying. Here&#39;s how:<a href="https://t.co/wLlCm6JoKv">https://t.co/wLlCm6JoKv</a></p>— Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) <a href="https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1412811418127278087?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 7, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

ASDS #3 is out and looking like a beast. From what I understand, this one can drive itself - no tug required.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Autonomous SpaceX droneship,<br>A Shortfall of Gravitas <a href="https://t.co/hNZ5U7nxUg">pic.twitter.com/hNZ5U7nxUg</a></p>— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1413598670331711493?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 9, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

We need a livestream here of Virgin Galactic taking off Sunday

WTF is that thing at 0:15?

Oil rig?

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/RTpWYWIfP7Y" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

So I guess traveling into space is going to replace Polo and horse racing as the new rich person thing.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Booster B3 continued to vent after today’s testing had concluded and the highway had reopened. ����<a href="https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@NASASpaceflight</a> <a href="https://t.co/RyNpZqiNV8">pic.twitter.com/RyNpZqiNV8</a></p>&mdash; Mary (@BocaChicaGal) <a href="https://twitter.com/BocaChicaGal/status/1414752752610258946?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 13, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Huh. That seems a little concerning, but I guess they know when the situation is safe.

Bezos goes up tommorrow morning. Live stream: https://www.blueorigin.com/

Hopefully that sleezy twat gets sucked out a window

20 Bezos is better than 1 Musk.

That was boring.

Both Bezos and Branson were spectacles of bullshit. Just the latest roller coaster. Both VG and BO had to rush to beat SpaceX ad the Inspiration 4 mission in order to not be completely irrelevant.

Na, the Boring Company is Musk's too. ;)

SpaceX fired three engines on BN3 yesterday. Looks cool, though this one is never going to fly, and they still need to attach like 20 more engines. ROFL

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Static fire as seen by <a href="https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@NASASpaceflight</a> <a href="https://t.co/hRPyDNPmMV">pic.twitter.com/hRPyDNPmMV</a></p>&mdash; Scott Manley (@DJSnM) <a href="https://twitter.com/DJSnM/status/1417274628246970368?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 20, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<samp class="EmbedCode-container"><code class="EmbedCode-code"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Depending on progress with Booster 4, we might try a 9 engine firing on Booster 3</p>&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1417277335863140363?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 20, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> </code></samp>
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I've seen and heard more of Bezos today than ever, combined. Dude comes off like he's a tad reeruned.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">NASA has selected Falcon Heavy to fly Europa Clipper! Launching in October 2024, this interplanetary mission will study whether Jupiter&#39;s icy moon Europa could have conditions suitable for life. <a href="https://t.co/KJt7Natn7i">https://t.co/KJt7Natn7i</a> <a href="https://t.co/sfcdrcKE77">pic.twitter.com/sfcdrcKE77</a></p>&mdash; SpaceX (@SpaceX) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1418667693016711170?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 23, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I have at last had time to create a movie showing the complete sol-133 <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MarsHelicopter?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#MarsHelicopter</a> flight. They went a loooong way with this one. <a href="https://t.co/NtacoGbyC8">pic.twitter.com/NtacoGbyC8</a></p>&mdash; Scott &quot;Black Lives Matter&quot; Maxwell (@marsroverdriver) <a href="https://twitter.com/marsroverdriver/status/1416894884179439616?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 18, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Damn. Do we know how far it traveled? Looked like a few hundred yards.

2,051 feet.

That's crazy. Glad it's holding up so well.

I honestly have no idea what was actually expected of it, but that distance seems a pretty underwhelming IMO