SpaceX Falcon 9 v1.1 - SES-8 - DISCUSSION THREAD

[Comga]

Wow.  Is everybody already taking a nap after their Thanksgiving meal?
Less than 90 minutes to launch and the update thread has two comments about progress to launch.
No video on the NASA feeds.  (They do have three exciting streams looking at the door to some oven.  Before the inevitable lame jokes, they are probably not cooking turkey in it.)

[QuantumG]

Transcript of (Elon's comments at) the pre-launch press conference here:

http://shitelonsays.com/transcript/spacex-ses-8-pre-launch-conference-2013-11-24

[tigerade]

Wow.  Is everybody already taking a nap after their Thanksgiving meal?
Less than 90 minutes to launch and the update thread has two comments about progress to launch.
No video on the NASA feeds.  (They do have three exciting streams looking at the door to some oven.  Before the inevitable lame jokes, they are probably not cooking turkey in it.)

I don't think so... 926 Guests, 351 Users (27 Hidden)

That seems pretty high.  Not sure how it compare to other launches though.

[veblen]

Wow.  Is everybody already taking a nap after their Thanksgiving meal?
Less than 90 minutes to launch and the update thread has two comments about progress to launch.
No video on the NASA feeds.  (They do have three exciting streams looking at the door to some oven.  Before the inevitable lame jokes, they are probably not cooking turkey in it.)

This is a private company launching another company's comm-sat. Stop slamming NASA. Your comments have no merit. Why don't you complain to SpaceX about their minimal web-cast this aft? Sheesh.

[Mader Levap]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

[QuantumG]

The webcast is here:

http://www.spacex.com/webcast/

[Halidon]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

[deltaV]

Transcript of (Elon's comments at) the pre-launch press conference here:

http://shitelonsays.com/transcript/spacex-ses-8-pre-launch-conference-2013-11-24

From that site:

SES was kind enough to say look, if we wanted to try to bring the stage back, they would support that, so it's really to their credit and we really appreciate that, but just to be super sure that even if there's an engine out, or multiple engines out, we can complete the mission with the maximum amount of likelihood, we will not be actually trying to recover the stage.

Why don't they have the flight control software decide whether to try recovery or not at first stage burnout? If there's enough propellant left then try to recover, otherwise don't.

[veblen]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

Just curious, did you tune into any of the NASA comet ISON coverage today?

[Prober]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

Just curious, did you tune into any of the NASA comet ISON coverage today?

Did NASA provide coverage?

[Comga]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

Because they HAVE live channels, many of which are broadcasting identical images.
If you are using the bandwidth, why not show something moving, like the clouds or a nearby beach, or a rocket spewing LOX boil-off?
Who says it is anything about this particular mission? 
And Halidon is right: "for the educational value"
And why not?
Note that my issue is primarily with SpaceX, which could let us see something of the progress to launch.
We all know they have no obligation to show us anything, but it would be nice to see. 
There is more action in our turkey cooking and the bread baking.
And not of this really means anything.  My professional interest would be satisfied with tomorrow's summary of success or failure in deploying SES-8.   It's just a personal interest in seeing things as they happen.

[Jim]

Why don't they have the flight control software decide whether to try recovery or not at first stage burnout? If there's enough propellant left then try to recover, otherwise don't.

Because they will likely burn the stage to depletion, so there is no propellant left in the stage.  The margin is in the second stage

[catdlr]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

Just curious, did you tune into any of the NASA comet ISON coverage today?

Here:
NASA Hangout: Comet ISON LIVE


Did NASA provide coverage?

[QuantumG]

SES was kind enough to say look, if we wanted to try to bring the stage back, they would support that, so it's really to their credit and we really appreciate that, but just to be super sure that even if there's an engine out, or multiple engines out, we can complete the mission with the maximum amount of likelihood, we will not be actually trying to recover the stage.

Why don't they have the flight control software decide whether to try recovery or not at first stage burnout? If there's enough propellant left then try to recover, otherwise don't.

Presumably, they're flying a different trajectory to the one required for recovery. Earlier thrust, different burnout altitude, more delta-v provided by the first stage, etc, etc.

[russianhalo117]

2 minutes till webcast start everyone

[MP99]

Transcript of (Elon's comments at) the pre-launch press conference here:

http://shitelonsays.com/transcript/spacex-ses-8-pre-launch-conference-2013-11-24

Thanks. These always appreciated.

Cheers, Martin

[Comga]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

Just curious, did you tune into any of the NASA comet ISON coverage today?

I saw (elsewhere) that the Comet did not make it past perihelion.  Too bad.
NASA had coverage of ISON?  I turned off NASA-TV when they started talking about Orion.  And I will have hardware on Orion.

[Mader Levap]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

Because they HAVE live channels, many of which are broadcasting identical images. If you are using the bandwidth, why not show something moving, like the clouds or a nearby beach, or a rocket spewing LOX boil-off?

I think SpaceX have some say in this. There was already one incident where they moved camera away.

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

What exactly is educational in this launch? What it have to do with NASA? Do you know it is launch of commercial comsat, not anything for NASA?

[veblen]

No video on the NASA feeds.

Tell me, WHY exactly NASA should have feed on this particular mission?

For the educational benefit?

Just curious, did you tune into any of the NASA comet ISON coverage today?

Did NASA provide coverage?

Yes. With live Google hang-out. Plus uber-coverage on various NASA mission sites.

[Halidon]

What exactly is educational in this launch? What it have to do with NASA? Do you know it is launch of commercial comsat, not anything for NASA?

Yes, I've followed NSF's rather excellent coverage for some time and since I'm literate I'm aware there is no NASA payload. But, and this is just my opinion, I believe there is educational value to be had in footage of every orbital launch. I'm not suggesting NASA should be covering this like they would one of their own missions, obviously that's unreasonable. I'm simply suggesting that NASA could stream from a webcam pointed toward SLC-40 and the content would have value.