I'm thinking there may have been a video delay and it locked up because the landing might not have gone well. i.e. Taken out the video hardware. Just a guess... hoping to be wrong.
If it was just the video that got taken out, they'd still have telemetry and they'd know what happened. They must have lost the satellite uplink, either by losing the equipment on the ship or by knocking the ship out of position so the antenna isn't aimed correctly.
My more conspiracy-minded thoughts have wondered about this. Yeah, it's probably a satellite connection and they can be flaky, especially at sea, but isn't it awfully convenient that the feed cut off mere moments before a bad landing? SpaceX PR is quite good indeed...
Of course Murphy's Law is in full effect, as the video on the drone ship cuts out right before the first stage lands.
On another note, I really like the orbital animation they're using, it reminds me of Kerbal Space Program. The ballistic arc turning into an orbit is a really good visualization for laypeople, I think.
I wonder how much of both there was left though. If they can salvage the engine it still might be a success. It would also depend on when the leg broke - do they vent any unspent LOX/Kerosene after they land?
You could vent the LOX. "Venting" the kerosene would just mean dumping it all over the deck. That doesn't seem like an awesome option...
My guess is there was 'plenty' of propellant left (to use a technical term for quantity...). The rocket could have flown back to the launch site, but they weren't able to get environmental clearance. While they may have adjusted the trajectory to take advantage of the downrange landing (letting the first stage burn longer), they wouldn't have had any reason to skimp on the propellant left over for landing, so I'm sure there was a healthy margin left in the tanks. More than enough for an impressive fireball.
What is the reason they cut the stream for events like this? Just so they can shift focus by writing a press release saying how they could salvage the most important stuff before the video hits the news?
It could indicate that, but the satellite connection that far out at sea is pretty flaky. A standard landing — with engine exhaust could also have cut the feed. Hell, even the pitching of the ocean could be enough to break the satellite connection.
The video feed from the drone ship is via satellite. You need a gyro system to keep the dish pointed at your satellite. These systems often can't keep up in rough seas.
There's a crucial bit of ambiguity there- when they say "on-target," do they mean that the rocket is now sitting on the barge with a broken leg, or did it bounce off and explode like on the previous attempts?
After watching the Florida landing a number of times, and taking into account that this maneuver is made more difficult by the fact that at its lowest thrust setting just one engine has more thrust than the booster weighs, trying to reach 0,0 velocity at a point and time, where the point is moving (the platform is rising and sinking in the swells) is likely not possible.
As I understand it, deep sea oil drilling platforms provide stability by using a very large "keel" under the platform with air pumps to keep the overall displacement relatively constant so that the platform's position relative to the drill is maintained (the drill being in the sea bed). The SeaLaunch vehicle that Boeing built has similar sorts of compensation strategies.
And that is a problem in that if you have to recover to land, you limit the missions where you can recover and that will impact the bonus of recoverable stages.
One wonders if there is some way to adapt a technique the Navy uses for landing helicopters in rough seas, where the helicopter "hooks" the deck and then applies a net positive collective to hold that line under tension, then the line is winched in bringing the helicopter down to the deck. Meanwhile the helicopter has matched the pitching of the deck because it is pulling against the tether at that point. A very complex system and I cannot fathom the challenge of building something like that on an autonomous landing barge.
Using a tether is the same as in med mooring a yacht. [1] The anchor is released and tight while the engines are in reverse. It's possible with a windlass to slowly take up or release more anchor chain.
Got any videos of that Navy technique? Can't say I've heard of it, and a few minutes of Youtube searches don't find anything. I have been in helicopters landing on ships at sea, though not in rough seas, and they didn't do anything particularly special. The helicopters did have landing gear with suspension and shock absorbers, though. I wonder how much shock absorption capability the F9 landing legs have, and if they can add in some more.
The video above shows the technique being practiced. I actually saw it as part of a show on small helicarriers that the Marines use, probably the show "Firepower" or "Wings" there was a period of time when I was researching military equipment in support of an RTS game design and I went through hours of documentary type shows to understand the capabilities around modern (late 20th century) weaponry.
What does it mean that a leg broke? Correct me if I'm wrong cause I'm no expert, but I'd assume that there'd be some 'emergency' backup legs to address this kind of event?
What does "not upright" mean? Did it crash? Or is it simply in limbo, leaning, at an x degree angle?
Every extra part is extra weight, needing extra fuel, which in turn needs extra-extra-fuel because of the weight of that new fuel, and so on. There is very little redundancy on a rocket.
It's unknown what exactly 'not upright' means just yet.
Now you have two problems. But I wonder if something much simpler, like a net, wouldn't make more sense. As soon as the rocket touches down, the net extents and wraps the rocket, keeping it upright.
Robot arms are a complex control problem all on their own. To catch the rocket they'd have to be very fast, and very precise. At the same time, the rocket's control loops already have only a very small margin for error. A small miss by either system and you have a much higher chance of failure.
In terms of a net, I imagine something that's lying on the deck under tension between four bendy rods. When the rocket is close enough, the rods snap over to the other side, furling the rocket in the net and holding it more or less steady.
I'm assuming that means it's in 10,000 pieces scattered across the Pacific. I'd be shocked if it didn't topple over, and once it goes over it's blowing up.
> 'emergency' backup legs to address this kind of event?
For the extra weight and complexity a second set of legs would add, I'd expect they'd shore up the primary legs instead, unless they were already at the threshold of being too heavy.
> 'emergency' backup legs to address this kind of event?
For the extra weight and complexity a second set of legs would add, I'd expect they'd shore up the primary legs instead, unless they were already at the threshold of being too heavy.
Does anybody know why they would re-try the barge thing when they've already got a once-proven way of landing on a pad? What is the benefit of being able to land on a barge? (which to me seems to be a lot harder than landing on land, after all, now you have two craft to coordinate, one of which is only nominally under your control (lat, long, the rest is very much subject to change due to the action of the ocean).
Edit: to elaborate, you can burn more fuel on the first stage, with all the advantages that implies, if you have a place to land down range as opposed to having to turn around and fly back. Sometimes the way to get that place to land might be to put it there.
Depending on the target orbit, it is often simply not possible to propel the first stage back to dry land. Today's Vandenberg launch into polar orbit was just that.
They said during prelaunch news conference that for this mission, falcon 9 had plenty of oomph to get the first stage back to the pad (payload mass is low), but couldn't because of environmental assessment not being ready.
Elon Musk explained why they need drone ship landings at all, once they have proved they can land on land: because some missions require landing downrange.
I explained that Hans Koenigsmann said 27 minutes 57 seconds into NASA's Jason-3 prelaunch new conference that they have to try to land the Jason-3 booster on drone ship instead of land because they don't have environmental approval at this time for Vandenberg AFB in Califiornia.
They need it for falcon heavy central core, and also for certain launches where they don't have enough deltav to return to landing site. Land is preferable of course.
The benefit of landing on the barge is that the barge can be located way downrange. This means the rocket can fly to it more directly, rather than making a U turn and flying back where it came from. That in turn means the rocket needs less fuel for landing maneuvers and can use more fuel for putting stuff into space. For some missions, the rocket won't have enough fuel to get the payload to orbit and return to the launch site for landing. The barge will allow first stage recovery for these missions.
As far as I understand this, the landing location depends on the launch site and mission profile - i.e. they can't always boost back to the pad with the remaining fuel stage 1 has.
Given that, then even if they'd decide to eventually launch every mission so that first stage can land on the ground, the current situation was that they could either waste the booster or try and land on water. So the question is - why shouldn't they try?
In this particular case the launch was from Vandenberg in California and they do not yet have permit clearances to land the first stage back on land here. However, as others have said the barge is key for other reasons too.
What is the point of this company? What benefits do I get from government spending my cash on the company? None.
If I want Mars experience, then I'll go to some shitty place in Nevada, which is much cheaper + human body is accustomed to Earth. I really don't get the fascination with SpaceX.
Haven't you got the memo? You are going to die, everyone you know is going to die and when the Sun explodes, Mars is not going to be spared either. This universe will end most likely in a heat death where life and computation will not be possible. Everything that is being done is ultimately pointless.
The point is that you, the taxpayer, even if you don't care about space, has to spend less of your cash than the comparable ways of putting stuff up. Quite a lot less.
Reporter: “Is it worth it? Should we just pull back, forget the whole thing as a bad idea and take care of our own problems at home?”
Commander Sinclair: “No. We have to stay here. And there’s a simple reason why: Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics, and you’ll get ten different answers. But there’s one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on: Whether it happens in a hundred years, or a thousand years, or a million years, eventually our sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won’t just take us, it’ll take Marilyn Monroe, and Lao-tzu, and Einstein, and Morobuto¹, and Buddy Holly and Aristophanes, and all of this… and all of this was for nothing. Unless we go to the stars.”
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[ 5.8 ms ] story [ 136 ms ] threadSpaceX webcast will go live here and on YouTube at about 1:15pm ET/10:15am PT. For our full hosted webcast, use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivdKRJzl6y0 For views of rocket, launch countdown audio and telemetry info, use this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkz_lclGXNg
Easiest fix would probably be to embed the youtube video instead.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BAqirNbwEc0/
It's pretty amazing, and a bit sad. They landed perfectly, and then the bad leg collapsed after.
On another note, I really like the orbital animation they're using, it reminds me of Kerbal Space Program. The ballistic arc turning into an orbit is a really good visualization for laypeople, I think.
"Schrodinger's rocket: simultaneously landed and not landed at the same time." - retiringonmars
Edit: someone opened the box...it crashed Edit2: What's up with the downvotes? Are you not supposed to re-post a quote?
GP is in reference to the polar orbit insertion burn for the stage that's in orbit.
footage later (in a few hours)
My guess is there was 'plenty' of propellant left (to use a technical term for quantity...). The rocket could have flown back to the launch site, but they weren't able to get environmental clearance. While they may have adjusted the trajectory to take advantage of the downrange landing (letting the first stage burn longer), they wouldn't have had any reason to skimp on the propellant left over for landing, so I'm sure there was a healthy margin left in the tanks. More than enough for an impressive fireball.
I think we'll have to wait and see to know more.
Especially when empty, the main structure is very fragile - having the side hit the barge would almost certainly rupture it, resulting in a boom.
Rocket lying on its side, bottom end looks a mess though. There was apparently some level of deflagration.
As I understand it, deep sea oil drilling platforms provide stability by using a very large "keel" under the platform with air pumps to keep the overall displacement relatively constant so that the platform's position relative to the drill is maintained (the drill being in the sea bed). The SeaLaunch vehicle that Boeing built has similar sorts of compensation strategies.
And that is a problem in that if you have to recover to land, you limit the missions where you can recover and that will impact the bonus of recoverable stages.
One wonders if there is some way to adapt a technique the Navy uses for landing helicopters in rough seas, where the helicopter "hooks" the deck and then applies a net positive collective to hold that line under tension, then the line is winched in bringing the helicopter down to the deck. Meanwhile the helicopter has matched the pitching of the deck because it is pulling against the tether at that point. A very complex system and I cannot fathom the challenge of building something like that on an autonomous landing barge.
[1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1rUXmzdtMY
The video above shows the technique being practiced. I actually saw it as part of a show on small helicarriers that the Marines use, probably the show "Firepower" or "Wings" there was a period of time when I was researching military equipment in support of an RTS game design and I went through hours of documentary type shows to understand the capabilities around modern (late 20th century) weaponry.
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/688799901463883776
What does "not upright" mean? Did it crash? Or is it simply in limbo, leaning, at an x degree angle?
It's unknown what exactly 'not upright' means just yet.
How would you envision the net though? A net does sound simpler but I have a hard time picturing it
In terms of a net, I imagine something that's lying on the deck under tension between four bendy rods. When the rocket is close enough, the rods snap over to the other side, furling the rocket in the net and holding it more or less steady.
For the extra weight and complexity a second set of legs would add, I'd expect they'd shore up the primary legs instead, unless they were already at the threshold of being too heavy.
For the extra weight and complexity a second set of legs would add, I'd expect they'd shore up the primary legs instead, unless they were already at the threshold of being too heavy.
Edit: to elaborate, you can burn more fuel on the first stage, with all the advantages that implies, if you have a place to land down range as opposed to having to turn around and fly back. Sometimes the way to get that place to land might be to put it there.
"Ship landings are not needed for flexibility or to save fuel costs. Just not physically possible to return to launch site" - @elonmusk
One party or another has the wrong information _shrug_.
I explained that Hans Koenigsmann said 27 minutes 57 seconds into NASA's Jason-3 prelaunch new conference that they have to try to land the Jason-3 booster on drone ship instead of land because they don't have environmental approval at this time for Vandenberg AFB in Califiornia.
Given that, then even if they'd decide to eventually launch every mission so that first stage can land on the ground, the current situation was that they could either waste the booster or try and land on water. So the question is - why shouldn't they try?
If I want Mars experience, then I'll go to some shitty place in Nevada, which is much cheaper + human body is accustomed to Earth. I really don't get the fascination with SpaceX.
Commander Sinclair: “No. We have to stay here. And there’s a simple reason why: Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics, and you’ll get ten different answers. But there’s one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on: Whether it happens in a hundred years, or a thousand years, or a million years, eventually our sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won’t just take us, it’ll take Marilyn Monroe, and Lao-tzu, and Einstein, and Morobuto¹, and Buddy Holly and Aristophanes, and all of this… and all of this was for nothing. Unless we go to the stars.”
— Babylon 5, Season 1 Episode 4, Infection (1994)
① Fictional