Author Topic: SpaceX Starship : First Flight : Starbase, TX : 20 April 2023 - DISCUSSION  (Read 532601 times)

Offline OneSpeed

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No idea why this was dated 25 Mar.

In addition to the notice posted above, there are these two also ...

LHA and Space Debris maps from the NGA notices. Edit: added splashdown area.
« Last Edit: 04/01/2023 06:08 am by OneSpeed »

Offline mlindner

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So am I correct in assuming that this shows that there will be no attempt to land the booster?

Edit: This post is asking if this confirms there is no attempt to land the booster on the ocean in the Gulf.
« Last Edit: 04/01/2023 11:03 pm by mlindner »
LEO is the ocean, not an island (let alone a continent). We create cruise liners to ride the oceans, not artificial islands in the middle of them. We need a physical place, which has physical resources, to make our future out there.

Offline southshore26

There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

Offline kevinof

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So am I correct in assuming that this shows that there will be no attempt to land the booster?

Correct. Plan was always to splash both on the first attempt. Booster in the gulf and SS in Pacific.

Buoy deployment notice from USCG , they were spotted in the build site couple weeks ago and from the locations it seems that they will be used to support tracking the vehicle in flight


https://www.navcen.uscg.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/lnms/lnm0813g2023.pdf page 49
« Last Edit: 04/01/2023 09:30 pm by Aphelios »

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twitter.com/sciguyspace/status/1642271784270536706

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A booster on the mount, and a rocket at the pad. It is almost time for someone to hold Starship's beer.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/04/spacex-moves-starship-to-launch-site-and-liftoff-could-be-just-days-away/

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1642273756289671170

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More than days away, but hopefully not many weeks away

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https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1642283054780522497

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Based on the NOTAMs and Marco's estimate, here is a rendering of the Starship near-orbital test flight trajectory (1/n)

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.... SE over the Atlantic...

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.. over Namibia and the Indian Ocean

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... past Indonesia and on to the Pacific ...

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... and then reentry at first perigee for debris impact 250 km NNE of Honolulu

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Zoom in on impact area

Offline mlindner

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There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

To be clear, and I've edited my post as such (I've been here a while, please assume normal assumptions of people asking questions on this forum), I was asking if this confirms there is no attempt for ocean landing in the Gulf of Mexico. As there doesn't seem to be any specific landing area like there is for Hawaii. It was always very obvious that there was no chance for a land landing.
« Last Edit: 04/01/2023 11:11 pm by mlindner »
LEO is the ocean, not an island (let alone a continent). We create cruise liners to ride the oceans, not artificial islands in the middle of them. We need a physical place, which has physical resources, to make our future out there.

Offline alugobi

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It's going to hit the water, one way or another.  Either they light the engines or they don't. 

So, a "soft" landing, or a fast, hard one.  What do you think they'll do?

Edit:  My own guess?  After we saw video and pics of that series of buoys that they had stacked around the site somewhere, I had the idea that they were going to put those out in the Gulf where they intend to boost back to.  And those will have cameras and other telemetry recording devices for recording the return to the surface.  So I vote "soft" landing, like they did with F9 several times.
« Last Edit: 04/02/2023 12:59 am by alugobi »

Offline jpo234

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twitter.com/sciguyspace/status/1642271784270536706

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A booster on the mount, and a rocket at the pad. It is almost time for someone to hold Starship's beer.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/04/spacex-moves-starship-to-launch-site-and-liftoff-could-be-just-days-away/

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1642273756289671170

Quote
More than days away, but hopefully not many weeks away
I haven't seen this mentioned, but Eric Berger's article includes a link to the WB-57 schedule that shows April 10th and 11th reserved for "Imaging"...
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.

Offline geza

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There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

I am surprised because there was quite specific talk here about SH boostback and offshore soft landing. In conjunction of an FCC submission it was even assumed that landing attempt & catch at the launch site was also in the cards. All of these were baseless speculation?

Offline jpo234

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There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

I am surprised because there was quite specific talk here about SH boostback and offshore soft landing. In conjunction of an FCC submission it was even assumed that landing attempt & catch at the launch site was also in the cards. All of these were baseless speculation?
An "offshore soft landing" would be in the Gulf of Mexico, so I don't see a contradiction.
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.

Offline kevinof

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There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

I am surprised because there was quite specific talk here about SH boostback and offshore soft landing. In conjunction of an FCC submission it was even assumed that landing attempt & catch at the launch site was also in the cards. All of these were baseless speculation?
NSF is great at going  “what if…” and adding lots of speculation. The only plan I’ve ever heard from SpaceX was no boostback, splash the booster in the gulf but attempt a soft splash to see how far they get. No way they are risking a boostback and catch on a first flight.

Offline eriblo

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There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

I am surprised because there was quite specific talk here about SH boostback and offshore soft landing. In conjunction of an FCC submission it was even assumed that landing attempt & catch at the launch site was also in the cards. All of these were baseless speculation?
NSF is great at going  “what if…” and adding lots of speculation. The only plan I’ve ever heard from SpaceX was no boostback, splash the booster in the gulf but attempt a soft splash to see how far they get. No way they are risking a boostback and catch on a first flight.
Original FCC exhibit 0748-EX-ST-2021
Quote
Flight Profile

The Starship Orbital test flight will originate from Starbase, TX. The Booster stage will separate approximately 170 seconds into flight. The Booster will then perform a partial return and land in the Gulf of Mexico approximately 20 miles from the shore.
Updated FCC exhibit 1169-EX-ST-2022
Quote
FLIGHT PROFILE

The Starship-Super Heavy test flight will originate from Starbase, TX. The booster stage will separate and will then perform a partial return and land in the Gulf of Mexico or return to Starbase and be caught by the launch tower.
There has been no mention of anything other than a boost back.
« Last Edit: 04/03/2023 12:05 pm by eriblo »

Offline crandles57

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There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

I am surprised because there was quite specific talk here about SH boostback and offshore soft landing. In conjunction of an FCC submission it was even assumed that landing attempt & catch at the launch site was also in the cards. All of these were baseless speculation?
NSF is great at going  “what if…” and adding lots of speculation. The only plan I’ve ever heard from SpaceX was no boostback, splash the booster in the gulf but attempt a soft splash to see how far they get. No way they are risking a boostback and catch on a first flight.

There was a document from SpaceX

This time around, SpaceX says that the Super Heavy booster will “will separate[,] perform a partial return[,] and land in the Gulf of Mexico or return to Starbase and be caught by the launch tower.”

Note the "or", so AFAIK it was never confirmed that they would as some media indicated. This always seemed an unlikely possibility to me as they will surely want to see that they can control its positioning before risking the tower. I think this should be viewed more like someone covering all eventualities than a serious plan to do it. So perhaps not completely baseless speculation but catch attempt always a pretty unlikely eventuality.

Offline Vettedrmr

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This always seemed an unlikely possibility to me as they will surely want to see that they can control its positioning before risking the tower.

I agree, but for a different reason.  They won't have had a chance to inspect the launch facilities before the booster lands, so they'll have little information on how it survived the first launch.
Aviation/space enthusiast, retired control system SW engineer, doesn't know anything!

Offline Tangilinear Interjar

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I'm pretty sure that the shock absorbing mechanism on the chopsticks is not operational yet. At least I haven't seen it tested any that should be a pretty obvious test.

That part of the system is critical for catching the booster.

Offline kevinof

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oops sorry. My bad!

There was never a plan for this booster to land anywhere other than the Gulf of Mexico

I am surprised because there was quite specific talk here about SH boostback and offshore soft landing. In conjunction of an FCC submission it was even assumed that landing attempt & catch at the launch site was also in the cards. All of these were baseless speculation?
NSF is great at going  “what if…” and adding lots of speculation. The only plan I’ve ever heard from SpaceX was no boostback, splash the booster in the gulf but attempt a soft splash to see how far they get. No way they are risking a boostback and catch on a first flight.
Original FCC exhibit 0748-EX-ST-2021
Quote
Flight Profile

The Starship Orbital test flight will originate from Starbase, TX. The Booster stage will separate approximately 170 seconds into flight. The Booster will then perform a partial return and land in the Gulf of Mexico approximately 20 miles from the shore.
Updated FCC exhibit 1169-EX-ST-2022
Quote
FLIGHT PROFILE

The Starship-Super Heavy test flight will originate from Starbase, TX. The booster stage will separate and will then perform a partial return and land in the Gulf of Mexico or return to Starbase and be caught by the launch tower.
There has been no mention of anything other than a boost back.

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https://twitter.com/michael10711597/status/1643058062696288256

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Buoy update: this is the grid conformation for SpaceX' PATON buoys for the first Starbase OFT flight. Stay out of area please.
Guaranteed excitement. @LunarCaveman @InfographicTony
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https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1643082032103424000

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Vehicles: B7/S24

Projected date: NET April 10, 2023

Key milestones to watch the rest of the way now live on nextspaceflight.com/starship and the Next Spaceflight app.

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