Space Travel & Exploration

[Nerraw]

Current (VERY UNOFFICIAL) rumor is April 10th.

[PACOX]

Hope it's sooner than later. For industry bragging rights, it would be nice for them to beat to be the (planned) maiden flight of Vulcan Centaur. The reason being are the rocket engines the Vulcan carries. The Vulcan will carry BE4 engines, which Blue Origin (Bezos) claims are a much better alternative to the Raptor engines on Starships stack. Assuming everything goes well with Vulcan, the BE4s will be used Blue Origin's Starship competitor, New Glenn. They claim New Glenn is a more practical and feasible alternative to SpaceX's Starship, and going to be annoying all hell if Vulcan goes up before Starship. Does it really matter which one goes up first? No, not for practical purposes. For bragging rights, yes. Kind of the same deal back when people were clambering that Starship would beat SLS up. It would move Blue Origin up in the billionaires space race, though. Vulcan is ULA's rocket, and it doesn't really matter for them whether they beat Starship up, ULA is going to get contracts regardless. Vulcan also isn't really part of the Starship vs New Glenn conversation, it features rocket engines that are critical to the conversation.


I just want to see Starship fly. Even if its just once, or just for its lunar lander missions the thing is going to be impressive to see.

[Nerraw]

Oh, it's beating Vulcan. Vulcan got delayed last week when they had an incident during the testing of the second stage.

[Biglog]

Bezos likes to compare ULA and SpaceX like they are equal competitors, but UAL is several years behind. The Raptors are being produced at ~1 a day, have had many successful flights and it's a proven engine. UAL is working towards their first launch with the BE4s. The BE4s are also $7M each (for only 10% more thrust being the "better"), vs. less than $1M per Raptor - with a target as production ramps up of $250k each. SpaceX also just had their 109'th successful launch recovery in a row, while UAL hasn't even started and is just now beginning to test different recovery methods.

It makes sense for NASA and others to give UAL some jobs for the sake of building competition, but it's a ways from there yet. Right now it's more like GM (SpaceX) and Alfa Romeo (UAL). But if the BE4 is successful that will be a step towards pulling them closer. It just cracked me up when Bezos was doing this when Blue Origin was barely reaching the Karman Line and more like a well-funded hobby rocket, while SpaceX was servicing the ISS at an exponentially higher altitude and level of difficulty. Apples and oranges.

[Nerraw]

Artemis 2 crew will be revealed in 40 minutes.



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Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, Jeremy Hansen.

https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/n...-under-artemis

[PACOX]

Cool to see a Canadian going up, they are a big part of NASA's programs.

[Pann]

Elon Musk Tweeted "Starship preparing for launch" with a video of Starship being stacked.

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1643873905113722880

Hopefully we are just a few days away from a launch.

[cubby]

Elon Musk Tweeted "Starship preparing for launch" with a video of Starship being stacked.

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1643873905113722880

Hopefully we are just a few days away from a launch.

Would be very exciting if they got a launch by next week. I believe Musk said it was 50/50 success chance.

[Osmeric]

Would be very exciting if they got a launch by next week. I believe Musk said it was 50/50 success chance.

It's going to be exciting however it turns out. I do hope it has good elements of success.

[Nerraw]

I think not blowing up the pad is a success in itself, since that's the most expensive and hard-to-replace part of the whole equation. Other than that I think MaxQ will be nice for them.

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@PACOX

Starship is definitely beating Vulcan.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2023...stage-anomaly/

[PACOX]

@PACOX

Starship is definitely beating Vulcan.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2023...stage-anomaly/

Oh that will definitely cost them.

[Osmeric]

I think not blowing up the pad is a success in itself, since that's the most expensive and hard-to-replace part of the whole equation. Other than that I think MaxQ will be nice for them.

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@PACOX

Starship is definitely beating Vulcan.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2023...stage-anomaly/

Boom!

https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/stat...07446516301826

[Nerraw]

I honestly had hoped we wouldn't get to see it, because someone is absolutely getting fired for sharing that.

[PACOX]

I honestly had hoped we wouldn't get to see it, because someone is absolutely getting fired for sharing that.

Doesn't appear that the CEO is actually trying to hide it. And the more I read about it it's obviously going to delay their first flight but the incident isn't out of the ordinary when it comes to testing new rockets

[Pann]

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/...ApBtOR1Aw&s=19

Fingers crossed it will happen this week.

[Nerraw]

Given that approval is still needed and a few outstanding items on the prep list are dependent on that, the rumored April 17th date seems rather realistic now. And then the frist attempt is scrubbed and we end up on 4/20.

[Nerraw]

ESA probe to Jupiter will launch in 45 minutes. Arrival in 8 years.



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No launch today. Heightened risk of lightning.

[George]

Given that approval is still needed and a few outstanding items on the prep list are dependent on that, the rumored April 17th date seems rather realistic now. And then the frist attempt is scrubbed and we end up on 4/20.

Oh, they absolutely target 4/20 because... Elon

[Nerraw]

Word is that the Starship launch license is coming down the pipe some time today.

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Time for another attempt in 45 mins.



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Successful launch, slightly delayed but successful acquisition of signal, and solar array deployment happened way ahead of time. Spacecraft is healthy as it heads on its 8 year journey to Jupiter.

[PACOX]

Love to see other agencies reaching the outer solar system