The Federal Aviation Administration has grounded SpaceX's Starship prototypes pending the results of a "mishap investigation" following this month's explosive orbital flight test. https://t.co/3kcpXE744z pic.twitter.com/qAjr6AYznB — IGN (@IGN) April 25, 2023 … Thankfully, no injuries have been documented as a result of the launch. However, the debris field was found to be significantly larger than …
Open Science-vs-Hype Thread: SpaceX On PausePost + Comments (78)
anyways, land back because you are self evidently unfit to manage it or usefully apply the technologies you’re so DESPERATELY proud of
“well you have to make some sacrifices for science” cool, how about you boost your speedrun of Why We Don’t Do Shit Like This Any More by faithfully recreating the Nedelin disaster
i have a lot of beef with NASA as a top-down nationalist colonial military project, but for the most part the people who work there and go into space want to advance space flight and satellite technology for the whole world
spacex employees want their stock options to appreciate
even at the height of the cold war, soviet and us scientists were making hardcopy of important safety info and passing it along to each other, cos they had more in common with each other than they did with their employers
they understood it was a species thing, a planet thing, in a way that transcended political allegiance. and that is deeply cool. i respect that so much.
elon musk wants to get to mars to claim it, for his own personal immortality project. he wants company towns and indenture.
SpaceX not only shouldn’t exist, they owe a massive amount of money to the american public as well as complete site cleanup, we’re talking years of COMBING THE SANDS VERY GENTLY, and compensation for damages to the state of texas and the people who live around boca chica
nobody should be landing on planets aside from the moon without it being an international venture every time.
and we can all start taxing our billionaires and restoring our communities to pay for it. we don’t need Dipshit Tony Stark acting like little lord mars
The ground damage isn't fatal to the program, but I see fans saying cringe stuff like, "the giant crater is a GOOD outcome because now it's less work digging a flame trench!".
Um no, it was a setback, and nearly blew the rocket up on the pad which would have meant no flight data https://t.co/G3B90y1aes
— David Burbach (also @dburbach Mast/Post) (@dburbach) April 24, 2023
Members of the public checking out the craters from debris after the road to Boca Chica State Beach was reopened. @AFPphoto @AFP pic.twitter.com/TS9GlpBMW1
— Patrick T. Fallon (@pfal) April 22, 2023
I’m seeing a lot of people classify the reactions to this morning’s launch into “space people” and “not space people” so in a likely futile attempt to give a little nuance to this hellsite:
1) I am definitely a space person
2) Someone I am personally close to works on Starship 1/— Emily J (@EmExAstris) April 20, 2023
3) Rockets blowing up is definitely part of the process of learning to not make them blow up
4) Space is hard. Everyone loses hardware.
5) It’s still very, very worth pointing and laughing at this loss because: 2/6) The US government in general, and NASA in particular, should not be subsidizing a company owned by a man who fascist, racist, transphobic, antisemitic, and every other variety of bigot. 3/
7) NASA has been asked repeatedly about their association with that man, and they dodge the question every time
8) I’m aware that he’s not “directly” running things any more. He still is CEO, Chairman, and has majority control of the company. 4/
9) There is absolutely nothing that company is doing that couldn’t be done elsewhere. Because the CEO has jackshit to do with the actual work.
10) So NASA should give the contracts it holds elsewhere and let the actual talent follow the money.
If you snitch tag, I block
Addendum:
12) That company has over $12 billion in NASA contracts. It has $2 billion in annual revenue. Make the board choose between the founder and the contracts and they only have one option.Further addendum:
13) While stipulating that:
a) Sometimes first launches blow up and that can be fine
b) They are not exactly equivalent vehicles…
SLS didn’t blow up on first launch.Addendum the third:
14) No one “blew up” $3 billion today. The vast majority of money spent “in space” goes to people’s salaries – no matter who is running the mission. I don’t know the actual, material costs of the lost vehicle and other damages, but it wasn’t $3 billion.
Here we go, a deep-dive on how the largest rocket in history was launched from a dirt-cheap site that would be substandard everywhere else in the world, including Russia and China.
This was a massive regulatory failure. There should be accountability.https://t.co/r3YgEngj89
— Max Kennerly (@MaxKennerly) April 22, 2023