SpaceX's Falcon 1 Destroyed During Maiden Voyage 293
legolas writes "SpaceX's Falcon 1 is the world's first privately funded satellite launch vehicle. After a successful static engine test on Wednesday, it was launched today. Unfortunately, the rocket was destroyed shortly after launch."
Early days (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Early days (Score:4, Insightful)
I noticed from TFA that SpaceX was touting this as the first totally new rocket design.
On that basis alone I'd expect it to be plagued with problems for several more iterations.
I'm pretty sure originality is not a desireable feature in rocket science.
Re:Early days (Score:3, Informative)
Yet ten years later, the U.S. astronauts walked on the moon.
Often great things arise from the ashes of early failure.
Re:Early days (Score:3, Funny)
Or did they? [wikipedia.org] ;-)
Re:Zefram Cochrane: Be of Good Cheer! (Score:3)
Yeah, and probably only because they want to enlist our aid in keeping those darn pesky Narns under control.
RIP Andreas Katsulas, May 18 1946 - Feb 13 2006
"I believe that when we leave a place a part of it goes with us and part of us remains. Go anywhere in these halls, when it is quiet, and just listen. After a while you will hear the echoes of all of our conversations, every thought and word we've exchanged. Long after we are gone, our vo
Re:here's a hint (Score:3)
One of my college professors passed out a paper which made roughly the above argument. They made what seemed like very reasoned, mathematical arguments to that effect. Of course, the naysayers were wrong.
Re:here's a hint (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:here's a hint (Score:5, Interesting)
As for traveling to the moon, that's just not comparable. The physics for going to the moon were well understood and within reach; that was just a question of technology and engineering.
For manned interplanetary and interstellar travel, it's not so much that we can make a reasoned argument against it, we don't even have a hint of the physics needed to make it work; current reactor, propulsion, and shielding technologies are many orders of magnitude away from what they would need to be for manned travel. And the technology being developed by SpaceX is completely irrelevant; it's a commercial launch vehicle, and an inefficient one at that--it has nothing to do with interplanetary or interstellar travel.
It's a different thing for unmanned interstellar travel: technologically, if we devote enough resources to it, we can probably send a small interstellar probe to a neighboring star system within the next century--it would be hugely expensive, but feasible.
Actually, I think the most likely path to manned space exploration is to reengineer people: radiation hardening, hibernation, vacuum resistance, and changes to the skeletal system, among others. If you do that well, you could send people in small pods and they might be able to work when they arrive. But I give it a century before people overcome their squeamishness to permit genetic engineering with people, and another century to do it. But you and I are never going to set foot on another planet.
Re:here's a hint (Score:4, Interesting)
Space is far too hostile and Homo Sapiens is far too frail and squishy for any large scale space travel. Somebody during the Apollo program made an estimate (conceivably pulled out of their butt) that there was a 10% chance per flight that there would be a solar flare large enough to kill the crew or at least abort the mission. There actually was a lethally large flare between Apollos 15 and 16. (Note that this doesn't mean it was all a hoax and they didn't go: it means they were heroes).
I firmly believe that intelligent life from Earth has a great future ahead of it in space. I just don't think it will be human life.
Re:here's a hint (Score:5, Insightful)
Say again? Interplanetary travel is quite well understood. It'd take some months but hardly out of reach. Now interstellar is a completely different ballgame. The solar system (diameter of Pluto's orbit) is about 80 AU wide, the nearest sun is 272000 AU away.
It's a different thing for unmanned interstellar travel: technologically, if we devote enough resources to it, we can probably send a small interstellar probe to a neighboring star system within the next century--it would be hugely expensive, but feasible.
As in arrive in the next century? Nope. With current tech we're talking about 75000 years or so. Even the most theoretical scenarios I've seen using ungodly amounts of antimatter as fuel takes about 20 years.
Actually, I think the most likely path to manned space exploration is to reengineer people: radiation hardening, hibernation, vacuum resistance, and changes to the skeletal system, among others. If you do that well, you could send people in small pods and they might be able to work when they arrive. But I give it a century before people overcome their squeamishness to permit genetic engineering with people, and another century to do it. But you and I are never going to set foot on another planet.
Interplanetary I don't see any reason why we couldn't do today. As for interstellar, I think it's far more likely we'll not actually send humans per se. Even with all the genetric modifications you suggest, sending humans is horribly inefficient. I think we'd send fertilized eggs and artificial wombs, or even just a DNA sequencer to do it on-site.
Re:here's a hint (Score:3, Insightful)
You're still thinking about moving chunks of mass around, not "travel".
Yes, with an enormous effort, you can move a small habitation module and a couple of occupants to Mars (might as well make it a one-way trip, since they're going to be sick anyway). But that's not the s
Impact or RSO destroyed? (Score:5, Funny)
Of course, it's never a good thing when your downward-pointing cam shows sky and clouds - spinning...
Re:Impact or RSO destroyed? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Impact or RSO destroyed? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Impact or RSO destroyed? (Score:3, Funny)
I had wondered... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Insightful)
The payload cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, true, but lifting it into orbit costs millions. As long as they had a better than 10% chance of success, it was a good risk to take.
Re:I had wondered... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I had wondered... (Score:3, Insightful)
(It's not necessary to know anything about past missions in order to estimate a chance of success. A bookmaker can offer odds on a horse that has never raced before.)
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Informative)
The payload massed 20kg (the Falcon could have lifted about 700kg) and was built by Air Force Academy cadets. I suspect it was being launched, er, would have been launched for free. After all, you have to test rockets with something, and you may as well launch something useful rather than a dumb telemetry package.
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, a large part of satellite cost is in the R&D, so if there are further funds, then building a duplicate would cost a fair bit less than the first one, right?
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I had wondered... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Interesting)
I think the Air Force giving SpaceX a launch contract was partially throwing them a bone to help get another launch provider off the ground (no pun intended), and partially saving money. No doubt had SpaceX not happened to be up-and-coming as they are, this would have gone up on a Pegasus or piggybacked with another satellite on a bigger rocket, like I believe the first Falcon-Sat was.
NASA's first failed attempts at orbit also had payloads on board.
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Interesting)
They have also thoroughly simulated the flight software, I believe with the hardware hooked up under simulated loads, as well. Of course, it's impossible to truly predict every contingency that the software will have to deal with, and given that the rocket began to exhibit uncontrolled roll rather than loss of power or anything like that, I suspect the problem does ultimately lie in the software rather than the power plant. We will have to wait for them to discuss their analysis to find out. I understand they have a relatively small code base, so hopefully they will be able to track it down quickly.
One other possibility I think fairly likely is vulnerability of their communications inside the rocket. Supposedly this is the first rocket to rely principly on ethernet, which reduces cost significantly over propriety methods. This is untested in flight, and interference or vibration may have caused problems.
I'm pretty bummed out by this, but their progress in the last couple of years is still impressive, and I'm looking forward to their eventual announcement of a second launch date. I wonder if it was a non-issue the recovery ship was out of position...or a good thing they moved it.
Re:I had wondered... (Score:3, Interesting)
OTOH, it's entirely possible that the fault lies with the power plant components th
Re:I had wondered... (Score:5, Informative)
"partially reusable rocket" (Score:5, Funny)
Or... (Score:2)
Re:"partially reusable rocket" (Score:2)
Re:"partially reusable rocket" (Score:5, Interesting)
This is the right way to do it, too. Lower stages are larger, so you can save more money making them reusable. They're less important for overall rocket performance, so when making them reusable reduces their performance it's not so bad. They don't reach orbital speeds, so you can recover them without reentry shields or even without flyback capability. If we're going to move toward reusable rockets (which could be a very good idea) at a gradual pace (which the Shuttle program has proved is a good idea), the way to start is from the bottom up.
Re:"partially reusable rocket" (Score:3, Funny)
Guidance? (Score:5, Informative)
It definitely cleared the pad and I think it got to a few thousand feet.
Re:Guidance? (Score:5, Interesting)
Hopefully we get more info soon and Elon flies the next one as soon as they figure it out. Take a page out of NASA's early history and just keep putting them up until you get it right. Luckily at $6 million a pop they're pretty reasonably priced compaired to other vehicles out there.
Re:Guidance? (Score:3, Insightful)
Take a page out of NASA's early history and just keep putting them up until you get it right.
That works when you've got essentially unlimited funding, like NASA got in the '60s. However, SpaceX, being a privately funded company has to get it right a lot faster than NASA before its contract pool dries up.
Or Engine (Score:4, Interesting)
Spaceflight Now [spaceflightnow.com] observed:
A further look at the imagery seen from the onboard camera mounted to the Falcon 1 shows a noticeable change in the color and shape of the flame coming from the Merlin first stage main engine as the vehicle seemed to roll. It was at that point the webcast provided to reporters covering the launch immediately stopped. Repeated efforts to reconnect to the feed were unsuccessful.
Seems to be a problem with the engine, a leak, or pump failure. A turbopump that has seized could induce a sharp roll.
Re:Or Engine (Score:2)
Re:Or Engine (Score:2)
True. I would think that they could debug guidance software pretty well seperate from the integrated rocket unless the sensor inputs were screwed up. I don't know how the first stage is guided, whether it uses gimbal mounted engines or vernier thrusters. Thrusters would be simpler, but I didn't see them. As for a structural problem, remember that the previous launch was scrubbed because of a tank overpressure. Who knows if it was really fixed.
Plume (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Plume (Score:2)
Re:Plume (Score:3, Informative)
Flames are supposed to come out the bottom, sometimes downwards out of side nozzles, but not out of the side of the rocket.
Re:Plume (Score:3, Funny)
I thought flames were supposed to come from Anonymous Cowards...
LOX blanket problem Re:Guidance? (Score:3, Interesting)
For example, if the blanket wrapped around a feedpipe for the engine and then got tugged by the plume or the airflow it could easily have disabled the engines.
Blankets like that are a known reliability issue, that's why the Shuttle has spray-on insulation on it's ET (not that that's been e
On the bright side... (Score:5, Funny)
Woohoo! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Woohoo! (Score:4, Funny)
Sure. It's not like you'll request a refund or anything.
Re:Woohoo! (Score:5, Funny)
How could I possibly return the tickets?
so *that's* why the webcast cut off... (Score:2)
These things happen...
This isn't... (Score:5, Insightful)
And to add insult to injury, we'll link your web server from Slashdot.
Seriously, Elon. Good on you. SpaceX is doing something risky and interesting. Make as many mistakes as it takes to get the job done. Unlike NASA, the bulk of your funding comes from a free market, and you're therefore motivated to learn from your mistakes. The day you build something your investors are willing to let you slap a "man-rated" label on, I'll be in line with tickets to fly on it.
Re:This isn't... (Score:4, Insightful)
*boggle*
I mean, we're talking about the same sort of folks who, in other industries, constantly push companies to release products as early as they can in order to start realizing a profit. Go look at the drug industry. As private companies have increasingly gained influence over the FDA through lobbyists, the number of things slipping through has increased. Private companies cannot be relied upon to have the best interests of anything but their own pocketbook.
Re:This isn't... (Score:3, Insightful)
>
> *boggle*
Yes, that is what I'm saying.
When NASA becomes "Need Another Seven Astronauts", they burn through several billion dollars in funding to fly nowhere, and to change the name to "Need Another Seven, Again".
When SpaceX, or Scaled Composities, or Armadillo, or any other startup blows up a manned spacecraft - twice - and for the same fundamental reason, they'll go out of business.
Out of curiosity -- would
Re:This isn't... (Score:3, Insightful)
You obviously have no clue the lengths the NASA contractors go to make safe spacecraft. The two shuttle disaster never had anything to do with the orbiter. It was always the add on stuff. Sure it was part of the whole package, but the contractor that made the orbiter did not make the external tanks and engines.
Out of curiosity -- would you prefer to fly JetBlue, or Aeroflot?
What a horrible example. What would you rather fly, SpaceX, the Shuttle, Soyuz, an Apollo circa 1972?
Re:This isn't... (Score:4, Informative)
The main engines are still cranky, though probably an order of magnitude better than the early Shuttle launches.
The hydrazine APUs are an issue.
Aging of the reinforced carbon-carbon leading edge panels is still not as well understood as we thought a few years ago, and may leave them much more vulnerable than we would like.
These are just the ones at the top of my head; last rundown I saw including all the age-related stuff they would need to recertify for flight past 2010 had several hundred crit-1 items.
Re:This isn't... (Score:4, Insightful)
Except they flew to SPACE, didn't they. I think NASA has even made it to orbit once or twice since the Challenger disaster, and I dare say they've had a couple successful experiments while they were up there.
Can private interests do this also? Probably.
Spaceflight is dangerous. Your jokes about the Challenger & Columbia accidents are pretty fucking lame.
Re:This isn't... (Score:2)
Sure, but space launch is a situation where safety has a direct impact on the company's pocketbook, which is why space launch companies are so paranoid about it.
Re:This isn't... (Score:2)
Not necessarily, but the investors providing the payload will be motivated to minimize their risk. If it's cheaper to improve the launch vehicle's reliability than to replace a lost satellite, you bet they'll work on improving reliability.
Eventually the system reaches a point where the rocket is safe enough that the chances of losing one's investment are very small.
Of course, once it's cheaper to just fly instead of improving saf
Re:This isn't... (Score:2)
Exactly the grandparent's point. Whose "pocketbook" is served when a rocket blows up, losing expensive cargo and/or killing passengers? Safety is a market force.
I am confident (Score:2, Insightful)
What a bad day at the office... (Score:2)
Re:What a bad day at the office... (Score:2)
More info on the failure. (Score:3, Informative)
Quoting Spaceflight Now (a real space news site!)
http://spaceflightnow.com/falcon/f1/status.html [spaceflightnow.com]
326 GMT (6:26 p.m. EST)
Here is the official statement from Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX:
"We had a successful liftoff and Falcon made it well clear of the launch pad, but unfortunately the vehicle was lost later in the first stage burn. More information will be posted once we have had time to analyze the problem."
2250 GMT (5:50 p.m. EST)
A further look at the imagery seen from the onboard camera mounted to the Falcon 1 shows a noticeable change in the color and shape of the flame coming from the Merlin first stage main engine as the vehicle seemed to roll. It was at that point the webcast provided to reporters covering the launch immediately stopped. Repeated efforts to reconnect to the feed were unsuccessful.
Re:More info on the failure. (Score:3, Interesting)
More details of the flight (Score:4, Informative)
Video URL (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Video URL (Score:3, Interesting)
Name change? (Score:3, Funny)
Space Aint Cheap (Score:5, Interesting)
Qinetic are about to test fire a £1 million scramjet directly into the ground. If it works it will fire for 6 seconds before it hits earth at mach 7.
The problem with seeking venture capital is the the investors usually want a return of their investment within a specified (Probably too short) time frame.
Successful space exploration takes man decades not man hours.
Anyone know? (Score:2)
Re:Anyone know? (Score:2)
Nope (Score:2)
Re:Anyone know? (Score:5, Interesting)
That reminds me of an interesting talk I attended by an X-ray astro-physicist back in college. He had been involved in several launches. Not surprisingly, they are very personally invested in the payloads, since they spend quite a few years fighting for budgeting and designing and building, and plan to spend several more years analyzing data. He said there was one launch where the rocket went off course and the Range Safety Officer gave the order to blow it, but the lead scientist jumped on the guy in charge of the button in a rather desperate attempt to save his project (which was doomed anyways). Since then, the customers have been kept in a seperate room from the RSO's.
Smells of a tall tale, but probably based on fact.
Obligatory Chuck Norris comment (Score:3, Funny)
Darn (Score:4, Informative)
Well, this is fairly typical for the first launch of a new vehicle. I hope they will figure out the problem soon and be ready for a second attempt not long after. Elon Musk has said he can afford up to three straight failures before he will decide if they should give up or not.
Also, an interesting comment from that page:
According to Astronautix, the Ariane 1 had failures on the 2nd and 5th launches and Aerospatiale spent a lot more than SpaceX.
Both SpaceflightNow and the forum on NasaSpaceFlight are speculating it was an ablative engine failure. If so, I would imagine they'll hold off on any more launches until the regen Merlin 1B is ready. According to an SpaceX update in mid-2005, they should already have a dozen 1Bs by the end of the 2005. Or it could be the turbopump which according to SpaceX engine page is also responsible for roll control. That might explain why it started to roll after launch.
This is exactly why I love software on the web (Score:2)
SpaceX's Falcon 1 Destroyed During Maiden Voyage (Score:3, Interesting)
Hard/Expensive lessons (Score:3, Insightful)
Ariane 5 (Score:5, Informative)
Maiden flights are perilous things. They got a full minute of flight data that they didn't have before. I'm sure the next one will be a success.
A launch a day keeps the high costs away (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)
Master Blasters (Score:3, Interesting)
Is there something I'm missing here?
We have very well-known research that dates back to Goddard and a little later, the V-2, which launched successfully from cruder facilities.
Why is it that we continue to have a non-bulletproof system after all these years of engineering? This is like building cars 50 years later that still only go 12mph and sputter and smoke and backfire, and have to be cranked to run. How is it that we have cars that go 100mph easily, that are comfortable, fairly safe, and affordable by the average person?
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:2)
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:2)
Which would be totally fine with me, if this was the only place in the budget where this kind of bureaucratic math was being applied to falsely imply justification for incompetence or corruption.
I'm sure this sum total of this kind of thinking adds a good several hundred dollars to my annual tax burden.
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:2)
Not my two cents.
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Not completely correct... (Score:3, Insightful)
The other important thing to note is the Falcon system sports a reusable first stage and a disposable second stage. However the first stage has never been tested as to its reusability. You would think a resuable system would be tested for... reusability. Maybe stick a dummy load on it and try to fire it, let the dummy upper stage ballistically reenter, recover the first stage a
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:3, Interesting)
and when you add in that everything's going to be insured, it makes finantial sense.
You sure about that? The US government normally does not insure launches. It's self insured and eats the cost of failures.
Even private entities do not always insure launches, since the premium is a good chunk of replacement cost (sometimes as high as 25%). A new launcher may not even be able to secure insurance, which is why I suspect SpaceX pursued g
Re:First flight with a paying customer?! (Score:3, Insightful)
Paypal has its ups and downs. I for one haven't had any problems with them, but I don't use them very much. It's also the first major service of its kind, and given the number of customers it has, a very small percentage of pr
Re:Apparently (Score:3, Funny)
Told ya (Score:2)
Re:Crash and Burn Testing (Score:5, Insightful)
That is why demonstrated reliability cannot be replaced by calculation. Spacex bragged about their high reliability but it is all on paper. Successful rockets have tens of thousands of hours of debugging of problems built into them. You just never see it. Nothing can replace hours in the air. And they come slowly and at great expense.
Elon is now going to learn firsthand why spaceflight is so damn expensive. It is not the lack of innovation or intelligence at Lockheed Martin or Boeing- it is the brutal reality that nature imposes on lack of attention to detail and ignorance. It ain't the metal in the rocket - its the know-how in the people. We have to dig down to root cause on even the most innocuous anomaly - hence we know a lot more about flaws in parts than damn near anybody on the planet. But this knowledge is pricey.
Re:Crash and Burn Testing (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Crash and Burn Testing (Score:5, Interesting)
Shuttle NEVER flies flawlessly. It survives due to redundancy, the efforts of the people working on it, particular the foresight of some engineers, and in no small part, luck. When it fails, it fails due to lack of redundancy, a failure to be creative enough to foresee the failure mode, and an unforgiving environment.
So Elon was absolutely right but the true comparison is with software that may not be perfect but must at least handle problems gracefully (particularly with manned spaceflight) so that maybe the mission is degraded, but not finished. How do you get there? Shuttle still hasn't figured it out, so Elon can't really be faulted for a failure on the first try. He might even survive a second failure. Third time would be a death knell to commercial activity, even if he wanted to try further. It was mentioned elsewhere in the discussions that he'd stop if he got three failures and no successes--it'd be appropriate.
Our office (one of our jobs is to estimate rocket failure probability) pegged the likelihood of failure at 70%, so we weren't surprised. We were hoping he'd succeed, just realistic. Hopefully they'll learn from this one and succeed on the next one, but if you have an even money bet on his next launch, take failure.
Re:Privately funded? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, but... (Score:3, Interesting)
If I understand the general critique of the space establishment from the "rich hobbyists" is that you may well have any number of very bright engineers, but your corporate masters make a hell of a lot of money off cost-plus contracts using the same old stuff and have no incentive to actually build anything new and better. Even if somebody like Musk had have come along you wouldn't take his money because the
Re:Yes, but... (Score:3, Interesting)
As for the corporate "masters", your assessment, while totally understandable, is absolutely wrong. First of all no one is making much money on launching rockets. LM and Boeing management would love to get rid of the space launch divisions. They are packed with risk and produce very little money. Boeing has not made a cent on the Delta III and IV. They are billions in the hole. LM just had their first year in re
Re:Duh! (Score:3, Informative)