SXSW: Elon Musk Talks Reusable Rockets, Tesla Controversy 167
Nerval's Lobster writes "Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla Motors, took the keynote stage at this year's SXSW to talk about everything from space exploration to electric cars. Joining him onstage to ask questions was Chris Anderson, the former Wired editor and co-founder of 3DRobotics. Musk used his keynote discussion to show off a video of a rocket test, which he said had taken place earlier that week. In the video, a ten-story rocket takes off from a launching pad and hovers several hundred feet in the air before landing in the same spot, upright. It's an early test of SpaceX's reusable-rocket project. 'Reusability is extremely important,' Musk told the audience. 'If you think it's important that humanity extends beyond Earth and becomes a multitenant species' then reusable rockets will prove essential. Musk also talked about the recent controversy involving his Tesla Motors, which started when a New York Times reporter claimed in a much-circulated column that his electric-powered Model S sedan had ground to a halt during a test drive up the East Coast. 'I have no problem with negative feedback,' he told Anderson, in response to the latter's question. 'There have been hundreds of negative articles, and yet I've only spoken out a few times. I don't have a problem with critical reviews, I have a problem with false reviews.'"
Re:rocket up and down video (Score:2, Interesting)
Oh you naysayer, you! Mister Musk has demonstrated that he now has a solution for when you need to lift something light up a few hundred feet by rocket. This will surely change our lives forever.
That it has nothing whatsoever to do with landing a rocket that is in space is just you being negative. You're supposed to extrapolate that this is the first step towards that goal, even though tail landings aren't in anyone's plans, and has no place outside 1940-50s Sci Fi books.
By the way, I remember seeing a short clip of a German WWII rocket that lifted off, then put down again on its tail (without exploding). Anyone got a link?
It's relevant given that most of the Saturn research was directly based on V2, and that Space-X builds on that. There's nothing wrong with standing on the shoulder of giants - unless, of course, you beat your chest and pretend to be one.
Re:I call BS (Score:4, Interesting)
If you're going to be a physics pedant, at least get it right.
Drag is approximated by a Taylor series truncated at n=2 for low velocities. In reality, drag is more complicated than that.