Author Topic: The Falcon 9 (Amos-6) Elon-Fuelled Wild and Wacky Root Cause Theory Thread  (Read 217236 times)

Offline Jim

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OK Jim, whatever you say. The US military is dysfunctional and it and homeland security cannot defend the homeland against the threats they spent the last 15 years preparing for. You're absolutely right.
 

Been in the military and still deal with them from time to time.  They are reactionary and can do great things when given time to prepare. 

Offline rakaydos

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So, it seems the "more likely" unlikly theories are:

High explosive Sniper round (precursur sound is gunshot) from Lone Gunman, fired from on base.

Planted military fuel-air explosive on strongback (possibly using RP1 to make forensics even more difficult) placed by unknown actor.

Offline tyrred

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Bird sh!t... fuel source?

Offline PreferToLurk

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I wasn't going to post this until this new thread was created, but now that it is here, and I put in the work to make this composite image....   here we go! Please affix your tinfoil hats!

The "bird" that passes *in front* the F9 as it explodes appears in 8 frames of the original video (the 30fps video, not the upconverted 60fps interpolation junk).  I took those 8 frames and cut them up in GIMP so that I only had the 1/8th of the frame which contained the "bird", and then stitched them all together to make a composite of the flight path.  Keep in mind that because the "bird" is moving from right to left, time in this stitch is also moving from right to left.  The slice that contains the rocket is actually the second frame of the video which showed the explosion, the slice one to the right is actually when the explosion began. 

Anyway,  what struck me about the "bird", and the reason I keep using quotes around that word -- is that the "bird" appears to be behind the lightning tower in the final frame.  I know, I know --  this is probably a compression artifact.  BUT --  maybe it really is behind the lightning tower. 

Seems impossible -- if it did fly behind the tower, it would have to be traveling at least mach 2 (closer to mach 3) in order to cross the field of view in only 1/4 second.  And MUCH faster than that if it was even 2 miles out to sea. 

But in the realm of crazy ideas, a hypersonic vehicle passing by the rocket at the exact moment it explodes is about as crazy as it gets.  I wouldn't even post this if that last frame wasn't so strange --  the "bird" does not change much in terms of brightness or apparent size though out its' brief appearance except for that last frame!  There is no dark body ( a 2x2 pixel area present in all of the previous frames) and the lightning tower does not appear to be distorted in any way. 

Again, I don't know much about image compression beyond what I learned reading the landing video reconstruction thread a while back.  So maybe there is a good explanation for why the "bird" appears to be behind the tower when in reality it is still only a hundred meters in front of the camera.  But I can't explain it personally. 

Offline watermod

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The best way to detect anything small approaching  large infrastructure (at even supersonic speeds)  like a rocket on a launch site is to surround it with fields of "intelligent light".
The lead from the U of Louisville is no longer available but some of his people are along with those from the U of Kentucky.
STTR you want to look for it was in the 2007 time-frame on.   Title: "Optical Intrusion Alarm for Defense of Critical Infrastructure Under Conditions of Fog, Smoke or Fire".   
Technique doesn't protect but does detect with results in vectors and speeds.
Warning - lots of politicians with their hands out for IP rights lurk around it.

Offline AC in NC

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How big would that "bird" be to have been behind the towers.  It's a bird out of focus nearer the camera.

Offline demofsky

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I wasn't going to post this until this new thread was created, but now that it is here, and I put in the work to make this composite image....   here we go! Please affix your tinfoil hats!

The "bird" that passes *in front* the F9 as it explodes appears in 8 frames of the original video (the 30fps video, not the upconverted 60fps interpolation junk).  I took those 8 frames and cut them up in GIMP so that I only had the 1/8th of the frame which contained the "bird", and then stitched them all together to make a composite of the flight path.  Keep in mind that because the "bird" is moving from right to left, time in this stitch is also moving from right to left.  The slice that contains the rocket is actually the second frame of the video which showed the explosion, the slice one to the right is actually when the explosion began. 

Anyway,  what struck me about the "bird", and the reason I keep using quotes around that word -- is that the "bird" appears to be behind the lightning tower in the final frame.  I know, I know --  this is probably a compression artifact.  BUT --  maybe it really is behind the lightning tower. 

Seems impossible -- if it did fly behind the tower, it would have to be traveling at least mach 2 (closer to mach 3) in order to cross the field of view in only 1/4 second.  And MUCH faster than that if it was even 2 miles out to sea. 

But in the realm of crazy ideas, a hypersonic vehicle passing by the rocket at the exact moment it explodes is about as crazy as it gets.  I wouldn't even post this if that last frame wasn't so strange --  the "bird" does not change much in terms of brightness or apparent size though out its' brief appearance except for that last frame!  There is no dark body ( a 2x2 pixel area present in all of the previous frames) and the lightning tower does not appear to be distorted in any way. 

Again, I don't know much about image compression beyond what I learned reading the landing video reconstruction thread a while back.  So maybe there is a good explanation for why the "bird" appears to be behind the tower when in reality it is still only a hundred meters in front of the camera.  But I can't explain it personally.


I'm not saying it was an Alien Bird Drone (ABD).

But since we all have our tin foil hats on...

It was an Alien Bird Drone.

(Sorry but I have been waiting to use that line all week! :D )

Offline virnin

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Anyway,  what struck me about the "bird", and the reason I keep using quotes around that word -- is that the "bird" appears to be behind the lightning tower in the final frame.  I know, I know --  this is probably a compression artifact.  BUT --  maybe it really is behind the lightning tower.

At best, I see the blur as being adjacent to the corner of the tower, not behind it.  IMHO, what looks like a vertical spike from the corner of the tower in front of the blur is an artifact.  If the blur was in the vicinity of the rocket, it would have been illuminated, as least slightly, in those last few frames but I don't see any real difference.

Offline PreferToLurk

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Anyway,  what struck me about the "bird", and the reason I keep using quotes around that word -- is that the "bird" appears to be behind the lightning tower in the final frame.  I know, I know --  this is probably a compression artifact.  BUT --  maybe it really is behind the lightning tower.

At best, I see the blur as being adjacent to the corner of the tower, not behind it.  IMHO, what looks like a vertical spike from the corner of the tower in front of the blur is an artifact.  If the blur was in the vicinity of the rocket, it would have been illuminated, as least slightly, in those last few frames but I don't see any real difference.

Yes, the lack of illumination change clearly points to the "bird" being very close to the camera (and truly a bird) or behind the rocket and very far away.  Of course if it is very far away, it would have to be moving at an amazingly high speed to pass the field of view so quickly.  Still, I am puzzled why the bird is much lighter in the final frame.  Also, if you look at all of these frames in full, the lightning tower spikes and such do not change.  being so static makes me reluctant to call them an artifact, but that might just be my compression ignorance showing through.

Offline glennfish

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Ultimate conspiracy theory.

Shawyer created a working emdrive and was going to drag race the f9 to orbit, but his test coincided with the f9 and his device went superluminal and collided with s2 creating what we saw.

Because it went superluminal we can't see the collision and since his device was the size of a Dixie cup it created minimum damage on impact... For a Dixie cup that is....

Prove me wrong by voting by sending $ to  PayPal account below.  $50 if you agree, $100 if you disagree.

Offline ccicchitelli

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Ultimate conspiracy theory.

Shawyer created a working emdrive and was going to drag race the f9 to orbit

A working EmDrive is no longer a conspiracy theory :-P

Offline glennfish

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Ultimate conspiracy theory.

Shawyer created a working emdrive and was going to drag race the f9 to orbit

A working EmDrive is no longer a conspiracy theory :-P

I didn't see a deposit in my account.   Down votes are worth $100.  :)

Offline savuporo

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Every time a Proton blows up, at least one Russian official claims its sabotage. And every time it turns out to be absolutely true, as the leadership has been sabotaging their workforce, technical capabilities and funding.
Orion - the first and only manned not-too-deep-space craft

How big would that "bird" be to have been behind the towers.  It's a bird out of focus nearer the camera.

Not to mention that for something to be out of focus when a camera is (presumably) at infinity focus, it cannot be behind the objects in focus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperfocal_distance

That the camera was at infinity focus is absolutely a safe assumption given the range that was recorded at.

Offline ejb749

I'm not sure if this is wacky or not, but I might be seeing something real, or just animals in the clouds.
It looks like three events happen that are separate from the 'fireball'.  Something shoots out to the left, a flame leaps out to the left, and then flames leaps out to the right.  If you watch the original video further, you can see that smoke to the right looks different then the fireball, too.  Or maybe I'm seeing things..

Offline ejb749

I might be able to add two more lines to it, based on smoke trails that don't look like they are from the fireball.  That puts the initial ignition above and to the left of where we were thinking before.  To  me, it looks like this lines up with the top of the LOX tank.
« Last Edit: 09/10/2016 01:29 am by ejb749 »

Offline Rocket Science

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I'm not sure if this is wacky or not, but I might be seeing something real, or just animals in the clouds.
It looks like three events happen that are separate from the 'fireball'.  Something shoots out to the left, a flame leaps out to the left, and then flames leaps out to the right.  If you watch the original video further, you can see that smoke to the right looks different then the fireball, too.  Or maybe I'm seeing things..
We did track some objects earlier in the discussion thread three or so IIRC. I saw one to the left going down... Have a look, in case you didn't see it.
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=30981.1200
« Last Edit: 09/10/2016 01:33 am by Rocket Science »
"The laws of physics are unforgiving"
~Rob: Physics instructor, Aviator

Offline watermod

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FWIW, re gunshot theory.

An F9 is 12' wide.  At, say, 3600 yards - about 2 miles - that's a 6 2/3 minute of angle target, well within capability for a competent marksman.  But after that, the problems pile up:

- As noted above, you have to have figured out how to 'one shot kill' an F9.
- You have to have your ballistics dead on, and get your windage correct through 2 miles of air.
- For comparison, the longest recorded sniper kill on a human target is 2700 yards.  Shooting at that range with enough residual energy to kill requires something like a 50 cal or a 338 Lapua.  Hard to conceal, very hard to keep quiet.
- To punch 3/16 aluminum plus an inner structure, you likely need to have a supersonic projectile at target.  (I don't actually know terminal ballistics of a 50 or 338 vs. aluminum plate.)  That means you will have the characteristic 'whip crack' of a supersonic projectile at the target and all along its path there, which should be picked up on any sound sensor.
At 2 miles several types of modified 50 cal. sniper bullets could still be traveling supersonic.     Seriously.
People look the caliber and think my 50 or my Dragunov doesn't do supersonic.   Rest assured the sniper forms and ammo do do supersonic.   There is no need for your common machine gun or rifle to do supersonic.    A 50 caliber sniper bullet is typically 1/3 faster then it's Dragunov competitor  - think a speed range from 1250 to near 3000 mph at full velocity for the 50c sniper bullets depending on the bullet and gun and conditions. (I am curious if the new Russian sniper rifle to replace the Dragunov uses faster bullets with more mass)  If you are trying to tell the 2 apart in a firefight the vectors of the faster bullets will give you the 50 cal shooters shots and the slower ones the Dragunov's.   Both are damn hard to detect by IR cameras at more then 150 meters past their muzzles.  Honestly?  It's easier and more effective  to scan your surroundings for signatures of known gun optics than trying to spot supersonic bullets in flight.   

Offline ejb749

We did track some objects earlier in the discussion thread three or so IIRC. I saw one to the left going down... Have a look, in case you didn't see it.
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=30981.1200
Yeah, I was following that.  The piece that goes down doesn't show up until frame 11, and tumbles.  I think it may have been knocked loose by the initial event and comes from a point slightly lower.

The vectors I drew point to a different location then the previous tracking.
One more animated gif with an overlay...

Offline Jimmy_C

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It seems to me that the explosion came from around the same location as the second stage umbilical attachment point. What are some ways that can fail/explode during LOX fill with few warning signs? Contamination? Tear?

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