Author Topic: The Falcon 9 (Amos-6) Elon-Fuelled Wild and Wacky Root Cause Theory Thread  (Read 217238 times)

Offline Eerie

  • Member
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 858
  • Liked: 208
  • Likes Given: 25
Maybe Elon just posted it for the lulz.

Offline John Alan

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 958
  • Central IL - USA - Earth
    • Home of the ThreadRipper Cadillac
  • Liked: 721
  • Likes Given: 2735
ok... wacky idea I have been mulling for a week actually...  ???

Small amount of C4 and a detonator placed into the c-channel cross frame that makes up the lower set of supports on that pivoting support thing...
I know... way out there... But at least I said it now...  :P

Offline Norm38

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1696
  • Liked: 1272
  • Likes Given: 2317
Curiouser and curiouser.  I've stayed away from all the conspiracy theories (day after failure my father tells me it was ISIS to keep social media out of the Middle East), but Elon's statements are not encouraging. 

Presumably this means their telemetry investigations have run dry.  If any of the common theories (COPV, etc) were true, then they'd have telemetry showing a massive pressure increase prior to rupture.  I think we'd at least have a statement from Elon like after CRS-7 such as "telemetry data is contradictory/non-conclusive". Was telemetry normal right up until the explosion?

So they're starting to look external because they don't have any internal data to point to.  Okay, so drones were mentioned above.  But this isn't a soda can.  It's a very, very strong aluminum cylinder holding a lot of weight and pressure.  And all the commercial drones I've seen are mostly flimsy plastic.  How big and heavy would a drone have to be to not just bounce off?  Or are we talking about a drone armed with an explosive?  How would that not be on video?  I think a drone can be ruled out.  Agreed?

As for guns, I'd think more RPG than bullets.  But those leave smoke trails right?

Got me, this is turning into a James Bond movie.  Where the bad guy sneaks onto the base and plants a bomb on the rocket and disappears into the night.

Offline Rocket Science

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10586
  • NASA Educator Astronaut Candidate Applicant 2002
  • Liked: 4548
  • Likes Given: 13523
How secure is Static Test Road?
"The laws of physics are unforgiving"
~Rob: Physics instructor, Aviator

Offline Harold KSC

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 906
  • Liked: 11877
  • Likes Given: 60
How secure is Static Test Road?

Secure. No one unbadged is going to get near the pad. I'm going with a TE failure.

Online wes_wilson

  • Armchair Rocketeer
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 466
  • Florida
    • Foundations IT, Inc.
  • Liked: 542
  • Likes Given: 377
Fun thread. 

Let's see...  SpaceX's plan threatens various government interests related to SLS and SpaceX's rocket is destroyed on an Air Force base.  If the government did it, it would get you past all the security challenges and there's motive and access. 

Is there a grassy knoll nearby?
@SpaceX "When can I buy my ticket to Mars?"

Offline ugordan

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 8520
    • My mainly Cassini image gallery
  • Liked: 3543
  • Likes Given: 759
I'm going with a TE failure.

Are there any LOX pumps up there on the T/E?

Offline Eerie

  • Member
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 858
  • Liked: 208
  • Likes Given: 25
Fun thread. 

Let's see...  SpaceX's plan threatens various government interests related to SLS and SpaceX's rocket is destroyed on an Air Force base.  If the government did it, it would get you past all the security challenges and there's motive and access. 

Is there a grassy knoll nearby?

Is it the same government that gave SpaceX Commercial Cargo and Crew contracts in the first place?

Unless we have different parties inside the government fighting each other...

Is this how civil wars begin?

Offline Rocket Science

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 10586
  • NASA Educator Astronaut Candidate Applicant 2002
  • Liked: 4548
  • Likes Given: 13523
How secure is Static Test Road?

Secure. No one unbadged is going to get near the pad. I'm going with a TE failure.
Same here, I'm not a "grassy knoll type"... Unless it is disgruntled employee who would still have credentials I guess...
"The laws of physics are unforgiving"
~Rob: Physics instructor, Aviator

Online CraigLieb

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1193
  • Dallas Fort Worth
  • Liked: 1349
  • Likes Given: 2394
With a fairly new manufacturing environment, the idea that the design is sound, but Foreign Object Damage or Debris (FOD) is involved is a possibility.  All kinds of things get left in not very good places, and they can cause loss of vehicle.
On the ground floor of the National Space Foundation... Colonize Mars!

Offline jpo234

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2021
  • Liked: 2280
  • Likes Given: 2184
With a fairly new manufacturing environment, the idea that the design is sound, but Foreign Object Damage or Debris (FOD) is involved is a possibility.  All kinds of things get left in not very good places, and they can cause loss of vehicle.

While fueling up? I could understand this, if an object got into a turbo pump or something like this. But the S2 was only fueling up and previously passed acceptance testing in McGregor.
You want to be inspired by things. You want to wake up in the morning and think the future is going to be great. That's what being a spacefaring civilization is all about. It's about believing in the future and believing the future will be better than the past. And I can't think of anything more exciting than being out there among the stars.

Online Chris Bergin

With a fairly new manufacturing environment, the idea that the design is sound, but Foreign Object Damage or Debris (FOD) is involved is a possibility.  All kinds of things get left in not very good places, and they can cause loss of vehicle.

While fueling up? I could understand this, if an object got into a turbo pump or something like this. But the S2 was only fueling up and previously passed acceptance testing in McGregor.

Could be SLC-40 GSE unique. Would explain why they've found nothing wrong with the rocket (as it's suggested).
Support NSF via L2 -- Help improve NSF -- Site Rules/Feedback/Updates
**Not a L2 member? Whitelist this forum in your adblocker to support the site and ensure full functionality.**

Offline robert_d

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 356
  • Liked: 72
  • Likes Given: 118
Quote
    Particularly trying to understand the quieter bang sound a few seconds before the fireball goes off. May come from rocket or something else.


Bolt shearing on COPV strut attach point as the tank shrinks faster than the COPV & support assembly?

Offline Mader Levap

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 976
  • Liked: 447
  • Likes Given: 561
I thought that the sounds in question were fairly conclusively determined to be junkyard noises on the other thread. I hope Elon isn't talking about the sounds on that vid...
I am sure he was talking about sounds recorded by SpaceX's equpment, not this disabled veteran's video.

For one thing, Elon talks about the sound heard on the USLaunchReport video
Do you have any basis for that assertion? You know that SpaceX has their own cameras and everything, right?

I consider insane that this thread actually exists. But sure, let's play conspiracy theorists. It is probably first time this kind of thing is allowed on NSF. :o It is fun!

So, sabotage... inside job.

PRO: Access and knowledge about what to do to make fireball from rocket.  Note: that would imply that someone outside of SpaceX (Chinese?) already knows way, way more about F9 than SpaceX would like. Bad, very bad, even without sabotage.

CON: It is hard to do it unnoticed. Not only you would have to bring it to rocket bypassing any security, removing/altering evidence of planting Bad Stuff would be required (not really feasible in Real World, but hey we are now playing CT). Either person that planted Thing to do Bad Stuff(tm) is also someone with access to videos (security?), or there are more conspirators working in SpaceX, making it unlikely. I mean, even more unlikely than one lone saboteur.

Final word: in my complete layman (so worthless) opinion this failure may be related to densified prop. AFAIK this kind of prop in rocketry is used commercially only by SpaceX (beside that only experimentally and theoretically in labs etc), so it is very possible that SpaceX discovered to their dismay that these things are tricky. Trickier than thought before. They wanted to test out things like prolonged hold on this SF, after all...
Be successful.  Then tell the haters to (BLEEP) off. - deruch
...and if you have failure, tell it anyway.

Offline matthewkantar

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2076
  • Liked: 2506
  • Likes Given: 2211
Any guesses as to what would happen to the Myth Busters' propane tank if it was surrounded by vented LOX?

Another problem with Myth Busters, they seem to have no understanding of statistics. They looked at the danger of hitting a hammer with a hammer and concluded it was not at all dangerous. An uncle of mine had tendons in his arm severed by shrapnel from a hammer on hammer hit. Millions of people hitting innumerable hammers of every imaginable design and quality together will find the combination of criteria required for a bad outcome.

Matthew

Offline matthewkantar

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2076
  • Liked: 2506
  • Likes Given: 2211
Final word: in my complete layman (so worthless) opinion this failure may be related to densified prop. AFAIK this kind of prop in rocketry is used commercially only by SpaceX (beside that only experimentally and theoretically in labs etc), so it is very possible that SpaceX discovered to their dismay that these things are tricky. Trickier than thought before. They wanted to test out things like prolonged hold on this SF, after all...

Antares initially used densified LOX if I remember correctly.

Enjoy, Matthew

Offline Saabstory88

  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 195
  • United States
  • Liked: 158
  • Likes Given: 288
Are there any battery powered pieces of test equipment both small enough to be left accidently under the raceway covers and with enough cell energy to cause a problem?

Offline Brovane

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1285
  • United States
  • Liked: 828
  • Likes Given: 1797

Bullets release a shower of hot shrapnel and a massive shockwave when they go through a metal wall, especially into liquid. Kinetic anti-tank penetrators don't contain any explosive, but the conversion of kinetic to mechanical/thermal energy is enough to cause a massive explosion.

Not really, especially sheet metal

They do make a Armor Piercing/explosive/incendiary 50 Caliber round - The Raufoss Mk 211 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raufoss_Mk_211
"Look at that! If anybody ever said, "you'll be sitting in a spacecraft naked with a 134-pound backpack on your knees charging it", I'd have said "Aw, get serious". - John Young - Apollo-16

Offline Norm38

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1696
  • Liked: 1272
  • Likes Given: 2317
Quote
    Particularly trying to understand the quieter bang sound a few seconds before the fireball goes off. May come from rocket or something else.


Bolt shearing on COPV strut attach point as the tank shrinks faster than the COPV & support assembly?

As Jim said on the other thread, accelerometer data was able to triangulate the strut failure on CRS-7.  They should be able to do the same for an internal failure here, and don't seem to be able to do so.

Offline ellindsey

  • Member
  • Posts: 66
  • New Jersey
  • Liked: 54
  • Likes Given: 10
Are there any battery powered pieces of test equipment both small enough to be left accidently under the raceway covers and with enough cell energy to cause a problem?
Perhaps we should make sure none of the techs is missing their Galaxy Note 7 phone.

Tags:
 

Advertisement NovaTech
Advertisement Northrop Grumman
Advertisement
Advertisement Margaritaville Beach Resort South Padre Island
Advertisement Brady Kenniston
Advertisement NextSpaceflight
Advertisement Nathan Barker Photography
1