SpaceX Aims To Launch First Orbital Starship Flight in July (cnbc.com) 32
SpaceX is "shooting for July" to launch the first orbital spaceflight of its Starship rocket, company president Gwynne Shotwell said Friday. From a report: "I'm hoping we make it, but we all know that this is difficult," Shotwell said, speaking at the National Space Society's virtual International Space Development conference. "We are really on the cusp of flying that system, or at least attempting the first orbital flight of that system, really in the very near term," Shotwell added. SpaceX has conducted multiple short test flights of Starship prototypes over the past year, but reaching orbit represents the next step in testing the rocket. The company in May revealed its plan for the flight, which would launch from the company's facility in Texas and aim to splash down off the coast of Hawaii. Starship prototypes stand at about 160 feet tall, or around the size of a 16-story building, and are built of stainless steel -- representing the early version of the rocket that Musk unveiled in 2019. The rocket initially launches on a "Super Heavy" booster, which makes up the bottom half of the rocket and stands about 230 feet tall. Together, Starship and Super Heavy will be nearly 400 feet tall when stacked for the launch.
Re:With what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
There's been 2 Cargo Dragons. One is also literally docked to the ISS right now.
Not sure exactly what more evidence is needed?
https://www.nasa.gov/subject/1... [nasa.gov]
Re:Who gives a dishy (Score:3)
They only have a license for a limited number right now, and they're working on getting the production cost down. All the satellites in the first shell are in orbit, but many are still moving up to their operational altitude, so the network may still have gaps until they're all in position. Hopefully they'll be able to move from beta to full service before the end of the year.
Long term, it would be great if they could do things like integrate the antenna into the Tesla solar roof (perhaps using Starlink t
Mars 2026 (Score:4, Funny)
SpaceX's progress is amazing. In 2026, Starship will land on Mars. The first mission to colonize Mars will be lead by Elon Musk himself with a handpicked team of two men and twenty four nubile women who will build an underground city called Zion. By 2030, most bitcoins will be mined on Mars providing funding for future missions and colonies.
In Your Face SLS (Score:4, Funny)
I notice that the Space Launch System will:
1) Not be reusable.
2) Launch a maximum of 130t vs 150t for the Starship Superheavy.
3) Not be ready for a launch until November.
But which point, SpaceX will have already eaten their lunch. Heck, they'll be on dessert.
Re:In Your Face SLS (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3)
Re:In Your Face SLS (Score:5, Interesting)
SLS should have been cheap. Just take four shuttle engines out of storage and a pair of shuttle SRBs. Redesign the external fuel tank to put the four engines on the bottom and carry a payload on the top (instead of the side). Done.
But it was a cost+ contract, and while it's the same companies doing the work, most or all of the people familiar with the old systems have undoubtedly moved on. Looking from the outside, it's easy to point blame, say it's really just a jobs program for Senator Shelby, and such, but without a good audit/study to see why it was so expensive, it's hard to be sure.
In any case, SLS looks now to be a backup in case Starship fails, which is looking less likely all the time.
Re: (Score:2)
July 2032 (Score:1)
> But which point, SpaceX will have already eaten their lunch. Heck, they'll be on dessert.
This is the same guy who said he'd have driverless cars going all the way across the US no later than - several years ago.
I could list off half a dozen other examples, but we all know them.
They'll lunch in July, I'm sure. Which year or even which decade, who knows. Maybe July 2042.
Fingers crossed and god speed, SpaceX. (Score:5, Insightful)
Watching SpaceX's progress, if you can ignore Musk's fantasy timelines, it seems like they're well on their way to getting a fully reusable heavy lifting space ship. As much as I feared over the years to never see humans with boots on another planetary body within my lifetime again, I'm beginning to feel a nearly unfamiliar feeling in these old bones: hope.
I'm almost as excited by the prospects of the fleets of ships mentioned at the end of the article as I am by just having a reusable heavy lifter to begin with. With all the garbage around us in the world, it's nice to have some little bright spots to watch. I'll be watching this test flight if at all possible and hoping for the best.
Re: (Score:2)
So far, even with a moron like Musk involved, SpaceX has arguably achieved more in less time than basically anyone else in rocketry.
SpaceX is standing on the shoulders of giants, yeah. That's how all things are done. They've also got a fundamentally more rapid development strategy based around making it cheap to test to destruction, which has paid massive dividends.
Even if all Musk did was recognize an opportunity and apply money to it, nobody else did what he's doing and the strategy is superior, so he's c
Nice motivation but I would say NET Septmber (Score:4, Insightful)
This is definitely a "Musk time" estimate. Lofty but really unrealistic. Keeping up on the progress in Texas there is just a lot to get done before any flight and they do seem importantly focused on the support systems now. Before that launch it seems like they will have to:
- Finish prep work on the launch table
- Finish prep work on the launch stand
- Mount the table to the stand
- Finish installing the remaining sections of the launch tower
- Install the crane onto the launch tower
- Install all the wiring and plumbing as well as stairs and elevator to the launch tower
- Plumb all the pipes, fueling and other GSE to the launch tower and stand
- Finish all the GSE tanking and plumbing
- Test all the GSE tanking and plumbing
- Finish the BN3 booster
- Finish the SN20 second stage
- Maybe SN20 will have thermal tiles for re-rentry? If so those will have to be fully installed, something we have not seen yet, only limited sections
- Have enough Raptor engines built and tested for the whole shebang, 29-32 for the booster plus 3 for the second stage if they are foregoing the vacuum Raptors.
- Cryo test both the booster and second stage as well as static fire tests
And those are just the items I can think of off the top of my head. It's a busy place down there now and while they are making record speed I think they are doing the right thing by getting the facility up and running now so more testing can take place later in the year.
Re:Nice motivation but I would say NET Septmber (Score:4)
This is a Gwynne Shotwell-stated goal. Gwynne tends to be much more realistic about timeframes than Musk is. If she thinks that it's achievable by the end of July, then I believe it. Not that it's defnitely going to be achieved, but that if things go well it is possible. Remember that many of the items on your list are being worked on in parallel. There's a lot of people involved in this.
BTW, apparently they're looking to have ~70 raptors verified by (can't remember the exact timeframe, wasn't too long away).
Re: (Score:2)
You might be right, it would be a hell of a show to see in the next 30 days. To me it just seems as fast as they are moving, and it is very fast for an infrastructure and construction project there's lot's of things to get right and lots of things that just will always take time no matter how many people are on it, "9 women can't make a baby in a month" type stuff.
Interesting about the Raptors, that's seems to be the limiting factor of launch cadence and if they have gotten close to that "one Raptor every
Re: (Score:2)
It's only a problem if you're trying to do something important on the next launch.
If you instead expect to get spectacular and entertaining balls of fire out of the first half-dozen launch attempts (along with some data collection), then go fever isn't much of a big deal.