Talk-Polywell.org

As I understand it, it was at 70% for yesterday, then a passing thunderstorm cut loose with lighting withing 10 mi only a few minutes before T-0 (at T-24 iirc), causing the scrub.

Does a rocket reach a velocity where something like hail would be a bigger deal than for an airliner? Aside from lightning and winds, thats the only other problem with inclement weather.

I don't know how far they've gotten on limiting weather's effects on prep, but if all they'd be worried about on weather is actual fueling and launch, you'd have a lot more windows.

From what I understand a big part of the weather concern is the risk of lightning strike during the ascent, and the damage that could cause to the craft.

Here is some footage of an intentional strike. The rocket launch exhaust increases the probability by factors A launch vehicle and its plume ascending through clouds can trigger lightning at lower electrical fields than required for natural lightning. That's because the vehicle and the plume act as conductors and decrease the electrical field strength necessary to create a lightning flash.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34NpyA2OuaE
the jokers in the above video can call lighting at will.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/23/1586 ... uglariasat

still a win.

The landing was tense.
I was pretty sure they'd lost it from the groans coming out of the control room (or at least just outside the control room).
The loss of signal was troubling but not unexpected - that I can say not seeing simultaneous live feeds from a barge out at sea and from the rocket landing on it was worrying is pretty amazing at al actually... How many years ago was it people were saying this wasn't even possible?
But it made it back, not as well centered as we've become used to and leaning a bit but back.
I wonder if they managed to nail it down with that new robot on the barge?
Be interesting to see the port side recovery pictures

Oh and they manged to launch that satellite in to the correct orbit too, guess that helps

and they are doing it again sunday: liftoff of SpaceX's ninth mission this year is scheduled for 1:25 p.m. PDT (4:25 EDT/2025 GMT). After sending 10 Iridium satellites on their way to orbit, the rocket's first stage will turn around and attempt to land itself on a drone barge floating in the Pacific Ocean.

A sweep of the weekend double-header! Static fire for July 4 launch as early as Thursday. Clearly, they seem to be having success in bumping up the launch cadence.

With 2 successful re-uses, I expect the dominoes will start falling quickly in terms of customers willing to ride the "flight-proven" ones. Actually a little surprised we haven't yet heard of the next re-use. Given SES-10 was the initial re-use, seems like it might make sense that the late July SES-11 be a re-use as well, though I expect we would have heard by now if that was the case.

Yes it was all rather impressive and somewhat nail-biting. The Sunday landing looked pretty dodgy - lots of buffeting on the way down. Still, they made it - again!

I imagine people are still a bit nervous about reused (flight proven? ) boosters. Sure, 2 out of 2 is good but most of these companies have a lot riding on them. The other problem perhaps is lead time, I imagine mission planning starts a good way in advance and that includes a decision on the booster to use and any necessary customization (minimal to none I'd hope, that should all be in the payload section right?). What I'd hope to see is an uptick in new orders asking after reused boosters. The competition must be terrified (erm, more terrified).

Anyway, all good. They've got a lot of launches already this year, they seem to have upped the cadence well and we've got some interesting launches coming up. Very very positive.

Fingers crossed for Falcon Heavy and maybe, if we're super lucky, a Dragon 2 test flight sometime this year.

And, at some point, the first 'third flight' launch...!

SpaceX is scheduled to launch another Falcon 9 rocket on July 2 with a backup window of July 3. that would be 3 in ten days, Looks like they are starting to put a dent in that 70 launch backlog.
This Sunday (July 2), SpaceX is scheduled to launch its third Falcon 9 rocket in just under 10 days, following launches on June 23 and 25.
https://www.space.com/37338-spacex-falc ... ement.html
The Falcon 9 is scheduled to take off from Launch Complex 39A at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida carrying Intelsat 35e, a broadband communications satellite. Spaceflight Now reports that the launch window will open at 7:36 p.m. EDT (2336 GMT).

...except that I guess SES-11 was delayed and there will be no launches for more than a month after this. Looks like the pipeline needs a better branch predictor?

Yes, I wonder if they can find some way to fill that gap. They've been doing so well otherwise

Third flight on a boosted would be great nice, wonder when we'll see that.

Some photos from the booster launched on Friday returning to port: http://www.floridatoday.com/story/tech/ ... 439348001/
You can apparently see the robot in there under the booster... I couldn't really make anything much out but perhaps that's just me.

Thanks for the link to the port entry.

The Leaning Tower of Falcon!

As I understand the boosters they are flying now are engineered and rated for 2 to 3 launches. So, we could well see a Threefor soon!

Yeah!

Go SpaceX! Real Science!

Mars needs grumpy old men? I can always dream. Grok....


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