European Vega Rocket Fails for the Second Time During Launch in the Last Two Years (theverge.com) 40
Late Monday night, a European rocket carrying two satellites failed during flight, leading to the loss of the payloads on board. It was the second major failure of this particular type of rocket within the last two years. From a report: The rocket that failed is called Vega, one of the primary rockets developed by European launch provider Arianespace. The vehicle took off last night from Europe's primary spaceport in French Guiana. On board the rocket was a Spanish Earth-imaging satellite called SEOSat-Ingenio, which would have been operated by the European Space Agency, and another imaging satellite from France called TARANIS. At about eight minutes into the flight, the engine on Vega's upper stage ignited. Right after that occurred, the rocket started to veer off course, and its altitude began dropping. After noticing the deviation, Arianespace tried to establish a signal with the rocket but ultimately couldn't connect, indicating that Vega had fallen out of orbit, destroying the two payloads on board. After looking over the data, the company believes that there was an issue with the system that activates the upper stage engine.
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Chevrolet Vega
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Very sad (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm always sad to hear of space failures like this from any quarter, as it's not one company or country vs another, but all of humanity vs space so any loss is felt keenly regardless of who has lost what.
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I'm always sad to hear of space failures like this from any quarter, as it's not one company or country vs another, but all of humanity vs space so any loss is felt keenly regardless of who has lost what.
Very well said. I think it's best to speak on Human terms whenever fitting, as hopefully we'll use it to find a cure for the Disease of Greed.
We Humans, carry many strains of the Disease that have carved and divided Earth between Yours and Mine. Funny how simple Irony would dissolve all carvings the moment an alien race appeared over the horizon. Even a global pandemic from a novel coronavirus, did nothing to dampen or threaten this ultimate Disease.
Wouldn't it be fantastic to focus our Human efforts t
Re: Very sad (Score:3)
No, it's white heterosexual cis-males. Remember that even though trans males are supposed to be considered to be real men, they're simultaneously supposed to be considered not to be real men in order to be considered eligible to compete in the oppression olympics and/or benefit from affirmative action.
Accident Forgivness? (Score:1)
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Stereotype much?
The vast majority of the earth's surface is NOT in flyover country and I've got a feeling that these areas will be a larger portion of the paying customer base for StarLink. Besides, the VAST majority of the people in this country already have high speed internet, including the people in the rural areas you like to hate. Very few folks don't have any ground based options for internet service.
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You need to get some more education. The vast majority of Earth's surface, as you say, isn't actually inhabited. And the election has shown very deciselvey that Trump voters live in rural areas. So relax, get a sense of humour and don't be such a pussy.
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You are a massive twat and I claim my $5
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You're not disagreeing with me. So call me what you like.
Rent A Ride On The Musky. (Score:3)
Guess it is time to start charging other countries for launches.
Re:Rent A Ride On The Musky. (Score:5, Informative)
Guess it is time to start charging other countries for launches.
SpaceX already provides launch services for other countries.
But these two satellites were owned by the ESA and CNES so it was not politically feasible for them to use SpaceX instead of their own launcher, despite SpaceX being both cheaper and more reliable.
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Why not license the tech and learn from it? There's a huge difference between not being able to launch, period, and being able to launch, rather reliably, with a high degree of reuse. It's our taxpayer money at work, dammit!
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It's quite simple. The ESA (European Space Agency) is a jobs program.
To justify paying for all those jobs they need to use their own internally developed rocket. To do otherwise would be to admit their jobs program is a failure.
Re:Rent A Ride On The Musky. (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope. We launch on European rockets because when Europe asked the Americans to launch the first commercial communications satellite, the Americans refused. We learned the hard way we need an independent launch capability.
Re:Rent A Ride On The Musky. (Score:5, Informative)
The ESA (European Space Agency) is a jobs program
Not really. It is the result of the will to have independent launch capability. France especially has wanted to have top-notch know-how for their ICBMs, I don't think that's changed.
Pre-SpaceX Ariane was also the main reliable and relatively affordable commercial launcher, at least for those not willing to go with the Russians. IIRC they covered more than half of the market. Arianeespace is also working on catching up to SpaceX, not necessarily by the same methods. e.g. they are pushing hard on 3D printed rocket engines etc.
Re:Rent A Ride On The Musky. (Score:5, Informative)
US law doesn't allow SpaceX to hire a foreigner, let alone sell a license to their designs. They can and do launch foreign payloads, but they can't transfer a rocket to another country.
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Why not license the tech and learn from it?
That makes no sense.
Using their own launcher makes sense politically.
Paying SpaceX to launch their satellites makes sense economically.
Licensing tech from SpaceX, but duplicating all the infrastructure, doesn't make sense either politically or economically.
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It makes sense to maintain an independent launch capability. What if the next Trump decides to have a trade war with the EU and refuses to launch EU satellites?
Also France has an independent ICBM capability that they wish to maintain, rather than relying on US supplied rockets like the UK does.
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Reusable ? No. NEXT ! (Score:1)
Any company still making non-reusable large rockets should GIVE UP NOW. They can only exist by throwing away government money that COULD be used to fund efficient launchers.
Northrop, ULA, Ariane - JUST STOP !
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No rockets for you! NEXT!
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Any company still making non-reusable large rockets should GIVE UP NOW. They can only exist by throwing away government money that COULD be used to fund efficient launchers.
Northrop, ULA, Ariane - JUST STOP !
Well, to be fair.. ULA Delta IV Heavy is the only option for the really large payloads (~63,000 lbs to LEO) or interplanetary mission profiles that require leaving earth orbit. Space X has some heavy lift capacity (~50,000 lbs to LEO) and has demonstrated they can get stuff out of earth orbit, but a Tesla Roadster is not a Mars rover weight wise. So where I get why SpaceX is the economy vendor for LEO or even geostationary orbits, ULA Delta IV Heavy is pretty much the only game in town once you need large
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Soon SpaceX will have Starship, and it will be game over. Assuming Starship works out, (and as 100% of SpaceX R&D is going into Starship right now I expect it will) they will undercut and rule the super heavy lift market just like they have for the medium lift market with Falcon 9.
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At this point, you might as well be the idiot on the corner screaming "Any company still manufacturing ICE vehicles should GIVE UP NOW..."
Despairing headshakes (Score:5, Informative)
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Ah, yeah, no if about it, this Arianespace concluded that must have happened already https://spacenews.com/human-er... [spacenews.com]
I know it's armchair engineering, but like the Proton failure you mentioned, this seems like the kind of human error that shouldn't be possible based on design and testing.
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Exactly:
"“This was clearly a production and quality issue, a series of human errors, and not a design one,” Lagier said."
No, it was a design issue. The connectors should have been different, fer chrissakes, and CaptainLugnuts told us why Ariane should have known better.
Conspiracy Time (Score:2)
boy, those aerospace industry giants are sure... (Score:1)