Did SpaceX's Explosive Starship Test Violate Its Launch License? (theverge.com) 211
The Verge reports that SpaceX's first high-altitude test flight of its Starship rocket, "which launched successfully but exploded in a botched landing attempt in December, violated the terms of its Federal Aviation Administration test license, according to two people familiar with the incident."
Both the landing explosion and license violation prompted a formal investigation by the FAA, driving regulators to put extra scrutiny on Elon Musk's hasty Mars rocket test campaign. The so-called mishap investigation was opened that week, focusing not only on the explosive landing but on SpaceX's refusal to stick to the terms of what the FAA authorized, the two people said. It was unclear what part of the test flight violated the FAA license, and an FAA spokesman declined to specify in a statement to The Verge.
"The FAA will continue to work with SpaceX to evaluate additional information provided by the company as part of its application to modify its launch license," FAA spokesman Steve Kulm said Friday. "While we recognize the importance of moving quickly to foster growth and innovation in commercial space, the FAA will not compromise its responsibility to protect public safety. We will approve the modification only after we are satisfied that SpaceX has taken the necessary steps to comply with regulatory requirements."
The heightened scrutiny from regulators after the launchpad spectacle has played a role in holding up SpaceX's latest "SN9" Starship test attempt, which the company said would happen on Thursday. The shiny steel alloy, 16-story-tall rocket was loaded with fuel and ready to fly. But at the time, FAA officials were still going through their license review process for the test because of several changes SpaceX made in its license application, a source said. Musk, frustrated with the process, took to Twitter.
"Unlike its aircraft division, which is fine, the FAA space division has a fundamentally broken regulatory structure," Musk tweeted on Thursday. "Their rules are meant for a handful of expendable launches per year from a few government facilities. Under those rules, humanity will never get to Mars."
The Verge also notes that Musk was asked by the Wall Street Journal what role government should play in regulating innovation just a few hours before Starship's test in December. Musk's reply? "A lot of the time, the best thing the government can do is just get out of the way."
"The FAA will continue to work with SpaceX to evaluate additional information provided by the company as part of its application to modify its launch license," FAA spokesman Steve Kulm said Friday. "While we recognize the importance of moving quickly to foster growth and innovation in commercial space, the FAA will not compromise its responsibility to protect public safety. We will approve the modification only after we are satisfied that SpaceX has taken the necessary steps to comply with regulatory requirements."
The heightened scrutiny from regulators after the launchpad spectacle has played a role in holding up SpaceX's latest "SN9" Starship test attempt, which the company said would happen on Thursday. The shiny steel alloy, 16-story-tall rocket was loaded with fuel and ready to fly. But at the time, FAA officials were still going through their license review process for the test because of several changes SpaceX made in its license application, a source said. Musk, frustrated with the process, took to Twitter.
"Unlike its aircraft division, which is fine, the FAA space division has a fundamentally broken regulatory structure," Musk tweeted on Thursday. "Their rules are meant for a handful of expendable launches per year from a few government facilities. Under those rules, humanity will never get to Mars."
The Verge also notes that Musk was asked by the Wall Street Journal what role government should play in regulating innovation just a few hours before Starship's test in December. Musk's reply? "A lot of the time, the best thing the government can do is just get out of the way."
A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:5, Insightful)
He called the diver a "pedo". The other guy wasn't insulting Musk, he was just telling him what he thought about his death tube. There's a slight difference there. Elon won the libel case because the other side screwed up in their tactics.
Practically nothing Musk says is trustworthy. Read the thread about the delays to the new roadster for lists of examples of him lying, or at least twisting the truth. He's almost never met a deadline he set with Tesla. He lied about having funding to privatise the company. He took money from people for products that don't exist. He made up bullshit bout Hyperloop and the ridiculous electric aeroplane thing.
At this moment, we (the general public) have no idea what the problem is with the Starship licence. However, I provisionally think Musk's comments are bullshit because his comments usually are bullshit.
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He won is libel case because he is rich. He had the best lawyers and an unlimited defence budget. Even if found liable the consequences would have been trivial for him, because he's rich.
How much effect has that $40M SEC fine had on his tweets?
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I think it's pretty obvious that Unsworth calling out Musk for grandstanding and publicity whoring in the Thai cave rescue is an obvious case of the pot calling the kettle black. Unsworth's involvement in the rescue seems to have been pretty limited, and mostly involved providing commentary for journalists. He did have knowledge of the cave. Musk, on the other hand, is a billionair with access to massive resources. Not just money, but a large number of experts, including, notably, a company devoted to bori
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I have literally no respect for, or inclination to debate with, someone who either a) actually believes that Musk didn't lie in the twitter posts he made or who b) knows Musk lied but is such a Tesla zealot that they're willing to lie to defend him. I'd be terrified if I lived in a jurisdiction where courts could make that decision with that justification. Liking Tesla, even liking Musk, even thinking Musk was justified in lieing about him are legitimate views; not believing he was l
Re:A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, I wouldn't exactly trust him with my life, but I would trust Boeing management much much less. And yet the other FAA branch has been giving them a carte blanche for years, with well known results.
If you buy a huge plot of land, have a proven track record are driving innovation, then fast-tracking your flight plans, even if you make changes to them (this is actual rocket development, not pork-barelling money on iterations of 50 year old designs) should be standard.
Re: A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:5, Informative)
If we are going the Boeing route, airlines are avoiding aircraft built in the Atlanta factory. From what I have read this is because Boeing went with a workforce that had to aircraft industry experience and actively prevented experienced unionised workers from the Seattle plant going to work there.
For Tesla, they did get a government loan, but it was paid back ahead of schedule, while the old school companies have yet to do so.
As for SpaceX, he may be abusing things, but at the same time the company is innovating in a way there rest of the space industry is not. On the bright side at least the US has a structure that allows for orbital launches. In the meantime countries like Canada have no framework that would allow a launch from their territory.
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If we are going the Boeing route, airlines are avoiding aircraft built in the Atlanta factory.
Since Boeing doesn't actually build aircraft in Atlanta and as best I can tell all they do in the area is operate some kind of nebulous "test facility" with Georgia Tech, I too would avoid planes built at a plant that doesn't exist. But to be serious, I have no idea what you are talking about. I have a vague recollection that Boeing may have a plant in South Carolina. Maybe that is what you mean.
Re:A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:4, Insightful)
I still wish someone would take his fucking twitter away. I lose more respect for him every time he spews some stupid ass shit on it because he didn't get his way.
Re: A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:2)
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This happens if you keep surrounding yourself with ass-kissers and ay-sayers.
Re:A shame he's not trustworthy (Score:5, Insightful)
"He has no problem pulling in billions in indirect government subsidies by selling electric car credits when it suits him, but then bemoans government for getting involved when they pull him up for ignoring their rules."
Isn't this non-equivalence? In the first half of your example, you note [and I agree] that Tesla is able to sell credits to other car companies that allow those competitors to continue to produce and sell gas-guzzlers. Personally, I find this somewhat hypocritical of Tesla: if their aim is to save the planet by migrating away from fossil fuels, they shouldn't be perpetuating the use of fossil fuels in this way.
But then you note that Musk "bemoans government for getting involved when they pull him up for ignoring their rules".
Aren't we talking about two different departments in the Federal Government: I *think* (not sure) that it's the EPA that manages the vehicular tax credits, but its the FAA that manages rocket launches. We have to remember that each of these huge federal departments have politically appointed heads, many of whom will have their own priorities or agendas and who will implement strategies that nudge policy in different directions. I don't think its fair to compare these: they're just not equivalent.
None of which detracts from the fact that this is another case of Musk behaving like an AssHat on Twitter.
You would think that the SEC sanctions he received would have taught him that lesson. Apparently not.
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I don't think so. He specifically said that when it came to innovation it is often best for government to get out of the way; I think it is reasonable to consider electrification of automotives over the last decade as innovation. He may have been talking in the context of just spaceflight but I think it's reasonable to interpret it as his general perspective.
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telling him he can shove his sub where the sun doesn't shine
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He has no problem pulling in billions in indirect government subsidies by selling electric car credits when it suits him
Do you not understand the economic handles a government have to enact policy? What would you rather, the government use subsidies to drive industry or the government enact heavy handed regulation to force companies to do something?
However criticising a company for using the economic handles a government has and as a result actually achieving the outcome the government intended is just quite frankly the dumbest thing I've read in the past 2 weeks.
Let me flip this around back to you: Just WTF do you think gov
Fine? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Yes (Score:4, Interesting)
Reusable rockets are not appreciated, Boeing owns the FAA after all. Do you think they'd sit back and allow reusable rockets? They'll lose billions of dollars. I am sure it's worth to them a few million in bribes or worse to get billions in contracts for their disposable rockets.
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The same was said about the falcon rockets early on. Look where they are now.
Mars ? (Score:2, Insightful)
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I myself wouldn't want to go there either, unless there's an option for a return ticket.
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There is some glory in being the first, or many among the first, to set foot on Mars... but really how many ordinary people could name more than the two crew of Eagle?
So yeah, it's not a very attractive prospect, especially when Musk says that Earth laws won't apply on Mars which means it's his little kingdom.
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"Living on Mars would be worse than living in a prison on earth.
Only a nut would want to live there."
So you're volunteering?
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Living on Mars would be worse than living in a prison on earth. Only a nut would want to live there.
Well, you could argue that early humans on earth also had it worse than modern prison inmates, until technology and infrastructure was developed to bring the living standards up...
The difference with Mars is that you'd have a choice of whether or not to go there.
Reminds me the beginnings of automotive... (Score:5, Interesting)
There was a time, where regulations demanded a man with a red flag to run at least six paces ahead of a car, shouting warnings, so that pedestrians are warned about presence of the car and can step out of the way, to avoid accidents. Current FAA regulations regarding spaceflight seem to be a close counterpart.
Jurisdiction (Score:2)
"Humanity" isn't under the jurisdiction of the FAA. I'm sure there are other countries which would consider creating a suitable compliant regulatory authority if Musk wants to move all his manufacturing there - although that is somewhat an indictment of the imbalance between government and big business.
Rules. (Score:2)
If you disagree with a regulatory rule or law, you can't just knowingly break it without consequence. Protest. Change it. Demonstrate its futility. Petition. Change can come on the back of other things, but you'll still get the consequence for breaking the rule in the first place.
But just breaking it, when you know that's what you're doing, is just a way to get EVEN MORE rules in the way of what you want to do, to stop you just continuing breaking the rules anyway.
Re:Rules. (Score:4, Insightful)
Sometimes, the best way to protest a rule is to break the rule. Rosa Parks, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela spring to mind. Yes, those are all civil rights activists, but there's no reason breaking rules in order to protest them should be restricted to civil rights issues.
If SpaceX and Elon Musk were aware they were breaking an FAA rule and did it anyway, then they were obviously prepared to face the consequences. That doesn't mean they can't also protest the rule and its consequences.
FAA is used to tested, safe aircraft (Score:4, Interesting)
Solution: move the testing to a missile range, or make SpaceXs area into one, by letting SpaceX pay for some MPs and a few officers to be official in charge - just as on the Cape.
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Umm. No. The FAA is responsible for untested aircraft and the work that goes into making them safe. SpaceX Starship rockets are not missiles (there is a very specific difference). The FAA itself was a department called AST that oversees the development and launch of rocket vehicles. Full disclosure: I built rockets and have worked with the AST. The job of the AST is to understand the launch process before a rocket takes off. If there were issues in translation, that could explain a lot. SpaceX may have thou
Priorities (Score:3)
move launch facility to a friendlier country (Score:2)
I hear Antigua is nice this time of year.
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But has no launch facilities, or rocket factories, or fuel, or
the whole point of SpaceX's system is that it is all located in a small area, has few or no subcontractors, and so can rapidly innovate - moving the launches to another country over water would be a huge cost
The Bit Left Un-Said... (Score:5, Insightful)
This seems entirely odd. SpaceX pioneered reusable launch vehicles. They have tried and failed landings before so many times I've lost count. Starship is still very much in an experimental phase.
So if SpaceX requested a launch license for SN8, then wouldn't it be reasonable to expect their application to say something along the lines of:-
1. Launch vehicle with not more than [x] lbs of propellant and [y] lbs of oxidant.
2. Climb to an altitude of net less than [x1] feet and not more than [y1] feet, within a horizontal distance of not more than [z1] feet of the launch pad.
3. Include tests of thrust vectoring using one or more engines.
4. Descend to pad and attempt landing.
Now the interesting bit may well be in the last item in my suggested list, above. None of the F9 or FH landing tests involved rotating the vehicle body over for a simulated "Mars Atmosphere" descent before a final rotation to landing orientiation.
Did SpaceX omit that detail from their launch license application? If so - obvs I don't know - then maybe [just maybe] the FAA have grounds to be concerned.
On the other hand... if the FAA want to claim that they had no idea that this would need to form part of the SpaceX testing program, then someone needs to get fired. It is also worth remembering that the FAA must implicitly receive launch requests applications from companies that don't have even the tiniest fraction of the reputation that SpaceX have now established [whether you view that as a good or bad reputation is actually not relevant to this point]. If you were a brand new space company going to the FAA for the very first time with your first application for a launch license, exactly how much diligence would the FAA want to do? Exactly how much diligence did they do with the SN8 launch?
Put simply: is this a question of SpaceX failing to disclose, or the FAA failing to ask?
I can't imagine we'll know any time soon unless all the documentation is made public.
But without trying to prejudice the outcome of any subsequent investigation, I'd have to observe that given the inherently high risk of rocketry, the even higher risk of experimental rocketry and the long, long history of experimental US spaceflight... this whole thing smells a bit off.
It doesn't seem plausible to me that SpaceX would have "failed to mention something". Which leaves two possible scenarios: either the FAA "failed to ask" or SpaceX "said one thing but did another". If it's the former, this is a non-story. If it's the latter, then SpaceX deserve everything they get.
Best guess is that it is to do with engine swaps. (Score:3)
The lines were repaired, the engines swapped, the vehicle re-tested an flown.
The best guess for this violation is that a bureaucrat has decided that the damage, repairs and engine swaps were things that should have been reported, and subject to weeks or months of committee meetings been given a new launch authorization.
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Congratulations on one of the few on-topic replies.
"It doesn't seem plausible to me that SpaceX would have "failed to mention something". Which leaves two possible scenarios: either the FAA "failed to ask" or SpaceX "said one thing but did another". If it's the former, this is a non-story. If it's the latter, then SpaceX deserve everything they get."
I think it will probably be something that fell between the two, i.e. SpaceX thought they didn't have to mention a change ( engine swap ? ), the FAA thought the
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Here's why...
In the first reply to my original post, Robbak points out that a pre-launch test partially damage the pad and resulted in SpaceX making changes to the vehicle [engines were swapped out]. You then note that this might be the cause for a difference in understanding between SpaceX and the FAA.
This goes directly to another post I made with respect to the
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I am not always successful with such appeals to a regulator's better judgement, but I've learned that if you show a willingness to work with them, own up to mistakes, do the things you commit to do and don't try to hide things, you can end up with a constructive, respectful relationship.
Regulations (and regulators) are fluid. It's not like the cop who saw you roll through the stop sign, open and shut case. The regulations are open to some interpretation at every level. Again--I really, really disliked this article. It should have been far shorter and to the point. They heard there was a violation and they have absolutely no idea what the violation was.
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Captain Reynolds would be pissed (Score:4, Funny)
Apparently, the FAA CAN take the sky from me.
FAA is making biden look stupid (Score:2)
The aircraft division isn't "fine" (Score:2)
from TFA and Musk's tweet: "Unlike its aircraft division, which is fine, the FAA ...
The aircraft division is f''d up too. It took the FAA (working through the Portland FSDO) from November 6 until January 30 to issue my Repairman's Certificate. This is needed for signing off an annual Condition Inspection on an airplane I built myself.
In my own situation I find it hard to see the FAA's value proposition especially considering the large number of six-figure salary employees it has. Many of my general avia
Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:5, Insightful)
Lots of people say that and then when something horrible happens they blame the government for not doing more.
I'd rather there be an abundance of caution than a lack of it.
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The real issue here is the FAA isn't responding to the permits fast enough,
Then perhaps Musk shouldn't be making changes at the last minute but stick to what he originally said.
But at the time, FAA officials were still going through their license review process for the test because of several changes SpaceX made in its license application, a source said.
You're probably one of those programmers who says, "I'll just tweak this little bit even though the code's going live tomorrow. No one will know."
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What changes were these? Looking at news like this, I see a lot of outlets repeating the line that SpaceX violated their license, but did they really? Rocket launches happen in the real world, adjustments need to be made to handle real world conditions.
Re:China takes over US Gov't, shuts down SpaceX... (Score:5, Informative)
Are you aware of the timeline here at all? We're 11 days into the Biden administration. This launch was back in December and, as the summary notes, the FAA investigation started the same week. So this was during the Trump administration, under FAA head Stephen Dickson, who was an airline executive appointed by Donald Trump.
Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd rather there be an abundance of caution than a lack of it.
The Boeing 737 springs to mind.
Caution seems to vanish when it's a blue-eyed, square-jawed American company that needs the rules bent.
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in other news 4 people die in Russia
Yuri -- died by vaccine
Ivan -- died by vaccine
Boris -- died by vaccine
Dimitry -- Died by blow to head for not taking vaccine
Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:5, Insightful)
The Boeing 737 springs to mind.
The Boeing 737 had people on board.
StarShip didn't, and there were no people in the flight path either.
Applying the standards of manned flight to an empty vessel is ridiculous.
SpaceX designs rockets the way programmers design software: Run unit tests, fail, fix the problem, fail again. That is a much faster and better way to get stuff done. Their record proves that and is way better than NASA's policy of "failure is not an option" that killed 14 astronauts.
The government needs to dial back on the smothering bureaucracy, or yet another industry will move overseas.
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I think you're missing the point, which is that when the company in question is a longstanding US stalwart with fingers in many pies including military and space - like Boeing - the rules don't seem to matter so much; but when it's a disruptive newcomer like SpaceX, they suddenly appear to matter a whole lot.
Furthermore, claiming that NASA's policies are the cause of astronaut deaths is mostly incorrect. If NASA had the money, it sure as hell would do as many destructive tests, taking as long as necessary,
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Watch for hit piece news and bureaucratic attacks. Watch the FAA claim SpaceX can't launch in international waters or from a foreign country. Or congress to claim it violates a treaty... some sort of regulatory excuse to slow or
Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:5, Insightful)
Lots of people say that and then when something horrible happens they blame the government for not doing more.
But nothing horrible did happen, did it? And as far as I know, everybody being well off isn't just sheer luck or incidental, it was planned to go this way (i.e. with the possibility of having a rocket explode without hurting anyone).
I'd really like to know what exactly it is that SpaceX supposedly did wrong, and the summary does a bad job of reporting it. And apparently also the FAA, which isn't even yet sure exactly which rule was violated.
If SpaceX did actively endanger general public, then yes, they should be on the hook for that, and that needs to be changed. However, having said that, my impression was that (1) SpaceX all along was essentially knowing that it's highly likely that they'll lose that rocket, and planned accordingly; (2) nobody could have gotten hurt, and the actual crime is not *endangering* anyone, but just *violating* a rule or other.
If that rule states something along the lines of "don't blow stuff up", then Musk is right: that should be up for debate. The way how rockets were built in the 70s (by not blowing stuff up) is all good 'n' well, but different engineers have different ways of doing things, and SpaceX is obviously a "haha, rocket go boom boom!" type of engineering company. If rules can't account for that despite SpaceX doing this safely, without endangering anyone, then it's the rules that need to change, not SpaceX.
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SpaceX is doing something no one thought would be possible and now doing it with such regularity that it's relatively boring. The FAA I feel is certain which rule was broken but the rule is probably so trivial that they want to act tough and yet couldn't if we really know what regulation was broken. Musk effectively hints at the issue by mentioning how these licenses limit the number of launches and may further limit them under the certain conditions you mention (your rocket blew up -- time for a 6 month in
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Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:4, Insightful)
Landing rockets on legs. It used to be a thing only found in sci-fi movies.
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What musk does is take old ideas, repackage them and pretend they are his own.
"Let's land rockets on legs using retrofire!" was nothing but a selection of old Amazing Stories covers until Elon Musk made it work. That is nothing like stealing someone else's patentable idea.
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Reusable rockets - old idea
Vacuum trains - old idea
Electric car - old idea
Tunnels - you get the
Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the disconnect we have here is the collective amnesia that sets in around these things. Before SpaceX actually did it, there were no shortage of voices all over the place, including on Slashdot, virtually frothing at the mouth insisting that Musk was insane to thing that he could land a booster after a launch, let alone re-use one. After they actually landed successfully, those voices switched to saying that it was a one time fluke. Then they landed multiple times, and they insisted that they would never be able to re-use them and they would not get the crash rate down. Then they managed both, and that's when the amnesia set in. So, now those voices have switched around to the narrative that they didn't do anything new and that we've always done this, and it's actually not only completely possible, but easy. So, whatever. I just get kind of sick of dealing with people who just keep moving the goalposts like that.
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Ideas are a dime a dozen; executing them successfully is an entirely different thing, and one that Musk absolutely deserves all the credit for. Yes, he's mostly been able to do it thanks to the power of money, not due to any particular business instinct or personal drive, but that's the reality of the world in which we live.
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Again, they did it on the moon in the 60's
Again and again, landing on a low-gravity airless body is nothing like getting through a dense planetary atmosphere and then landing in one g.
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..and there were plenty of people who worked for NASA who said, yep of course he can do that, we did it in the 60's but it was too unreliable then as we didn't have good enough computers, and it was near impossible manually (they tried both)
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Of course they're old ideas. The ideas themselves go back at least to the start of manned rocketry. Actually making them work is another thing entirely.
As far as goal posts being moved, let's not forget that this started with you replying to "SpaceX is doing something no one thought would be possible and now doing it with such regularity that it's relatively boring." Now, I will grant that there were in fact those that thought it was possible, but SpaceX was being widely mocked and ridiculed even by experts
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I think the disconnect we have here is the collective amnesia that sets in around these things. Before SpaceX actually did it, there were no shortage of voices all over the place, including on Slashdot, virtually frothing at the mouth insisting that Musk was insane to thing that he could land a booster after a launch, let alone re-use one. After they actually landed successfully, those voices switched to saying that it was a one time fluke. Then they landed multiple times, and they insisted that they would never be able to re-use them and they would not get the crash rate down. Then they managed both, and that's when the amnesia set in. So, now those voices have switched around to the narrative that they didn't do anything new and that we've always done this, and it's actually not only completely possible, but easy. So, whatever. I just get kind of sick of dealing with people who just keep moving the goalposts like that.
I hear this narrative but for the life of me I don't know why it matters. So what? So you were on the correct side in an online flame war a decade ago. Big deal.
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Ideas are cheap and easy (Score:2)
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NASA did this in the 60's, only experimentally as it proved too unreliable, but it's not a new idea
Elon Musk is a good entrepreneur, he takes old ideas that can now be made to work and markets them well ...
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There is no such thing as a new idea. It is impossible. We simply take a lot of old ideas and put them into a sort of mental kaleidoscope. We give them a turn and they make new and curious combinations. We keep on turning and making new combinations indefinitely; but they are the same old pieces of colored glass that have been in use through all the ages.
-Mark Twain
The iPhone didn't have any new ideas either but someone has to be the one to push the right ideas forward when the time comes.
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On the other hand, ideas are cheap. The hard work comes in successfully pulling off the implementation. Landing and recovering rocket boosters has been an idea as long as rocket boosters have existed, but ever since the early failures, the conventional wisdom has been that it is too hard to be practical. SpaceX deserves all the credit for deciding to try anyway, and then putting in the aforementioned hard work to make it happen.
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If that rule states something along the lines of "don't blow stuff up", then Musk is right: that should be up for debate. The way how rockets were built in the 70s (by not blowing stuff up) is all good 'n' well, but different engineers have different ways of doing things, and SpaceX is obviously a "haha, rocket go boom boom!" type of engineering company.
I don't think it's only a difference in technique. Before the 70s, rocketry and high speed and altitude aviation were cutting edge. Many problems were unsolved. Aviators flying on the edge were known to be "pushing the envelope" [wikipedia.org] in order to learn more about aircraft and spacecraft behavior. Lots of stuff blew up in those days. It was extremely risky.
Around the late 1970s, it seems the attitude has changed. Most people seem to believe that everything is known and solved with aviation and space travel.
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First: if you're going to be a smart ass, the first step is to be smart. Otherwise you're just an ass.
Bat soup is most likely safe if it's properly cooked, and not contaminated with uncooked tissue (e.g. by a bloody spoon or kitchen knife) while being prepared. That is, of course, unless bat meat per se is poisonous or otherwise non-comestible (e.g. like some sharks, which essentially piss through their muscle tissue, making it unusable for us humans), but which I reckon isn't the case if bats apparently ge
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you better not suck at reading comprehension
I don't suck at reading comprehension. Which is why I know that you clearly don't even know the thing that they did wrong, and by implication how or what was dangerous.
I'd really like to know what exactly it is that SpaceX supposedly did wrong
Your own words quite obviously show you don't even know what they did wrong...
So how can you know that what they did was safe...
And you're meant to be the smart one...
You mentioned specific reasons why nothing bad happened that one time
I explained to you in a topical way how stupid it is to believe that.
Nothing went wrong last time. Th
Re: The best thing the government can do is just g (Score:2)
Re:The best thing the government can do is just ge (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: The best thing the government can do is just g (Score:2)
True. And the area was cleared for the launch. Notice how the faa isn't saying which regation was violated?
I believe regulations are important however I also expect details on such topics. the faa isn't being forth coming.
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Why do you expect details? They may relate to proprietary information that the FAA cannot legally disclose at this point. Personally, I think, if they were allowed to disclose the details, they would. This lack of disclosure is hurting nobody except the FAA.
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Why do you expect details?
Because ultimately, the FAA and all other government agencies serve us and operate at our pleasure. Not the other way around.
They may relate to proprietary information that the FAA cannot legally disclose at this point.
That's pretty speculative. And even if it were true they could very easily say it relates to proprietary information.
Re: The best thing the government can do is just g (Score:5, Insightful)
Notice how the faa isn't saying which regation was violated?
Notice how Musk isn't saying either. FAA is likely not allowed to disclose anything about their clients but Musk almost certainly does not have such restrictions. If this were simply the FAA acting stupid, Musk would have shared it with the world a long time ago like he always does.
Re: The best thing the government can do is just g (Score:2)
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Not that remote: every time they launch, they have to evacuate local residents.
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Re:I guess... (Score:4, Informative)
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It may well be something else entirely, possibly even something not related to the rocket (but to the organization or perhaps the CEO ;)). If it were something stupid, I'd expect Musk to have shared it with the world.
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"I guess the previous license included "landing". And then it blew up, which is probably classified as a safety risk. Now they probably won't grant permission until the cause of that is known and measures have been implemented to prevent it the next time."
If that Administration had exited when the bothers Wright experimented, we would all still take the Titanic.
Re:FAA aircraft division is not fine (Score:4, Interesting)
The remit of the CAA is basically "air safety".
In the United States, the FAA has two main roles: one is "air safety", but the other is to "promote the use of air travel".
Those two objectives can come in to direct conflict all too easily, as we saw in part with the 737Max incident. If we really want to be able to trust civilian air travel, then we need to have trust in the oversight. In order to do that, I personally would like to see:-
1. The role of "promoting the use of air travel" to be re-located to the Commerce Department. it is, after all, promoting the commercial exploitation of air travel...
2. A total and permanent walk-back of the FAA rules by which they decided that it was acceptable for the companies they were supposed to be regulating to go out and hire, train and pay the salaries of the people who were supposed to be inspecting them. This is regulatory capture of the most blatant and egregious kind and it has to stop.
There's more that the FAA could do - in particular around greater transparency, in particular around laying down clear rules about such things as "what is a 'grounding issue'", in an effort to remove "subjectivity in the moment"... In other words, if the FAA put more effort in to defining what types of aircraft issue would warrant a grounding [as opposed, say, to an instruction to inspect and remediate if necessary] then manufacturers would have a much clearer understanding of their obligations. In turn, this would let them structure their business to be certain of compliance, to explain to their shareholders and customers and to follow the rules.
The problem with regulatory oversight of something as complex as aircraft is that absent such clear rules, everything comes down to subjective interpretation or opinion. The moment you have that, you open the door to "inducements". If everything stays "black and white" - and I know how hard it is to achieve, then it makes it that much harder for outbreaks of regulatory capture or "look the other way culture" to happen.
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