I got wrapped up in something and forgot to obsessively watch the launch, and was mildly confused when I checked in and saw the landed stage. (But… it hasn’t launched yet!?!)
This time, SpaceX released some fucking magnificent video from the rocket’s perspective, all the way from stage separation to landing.
Awesome. Better quality YouTube version here.
Reminiscent of NASA’s videos of the Shuttle booster descent. Real-time and sound would be nice…
No live stream VR from a 4k camera array? Might as well be in the dark ages of the early 21st century!
(Hopefully we’ll get the full res video as soon as they get the booster back in port and can upload the original.)
Another thought, prompted by that glorious Shuttle SRB video: even if there isn’t a high quality recording in audio frequencies for the Falcon booster reentry, I bet you could convert the vibration data from other frequency domains into some pretty amazing audio…
Yeah, I’ll bet you’re right. We know from the CRS-7 investigation that they have audio-frequency accelerometers onboard (not for main guidance, but for structural telemetry). They were able to pinpoint the structural failure by triangulation of the pressure wave. They must then have data at multi-kilohertz rates; that should make for some pretty nice sounds.
I don’t know if this is embarrassing or just sublime:
I didn’t even know there was to be a launch.
Either Elon is getting incredibly good at this or incredibly bad at promotion.
How many more launches until the Gigafactory is complete?
Soon, it will be notable when SpaceX launches a rocket and doesn’t successfully land the first stage afterwards.
Though if they keep launching and recovering them at this rate, and don’t start re-flying them, they’re going to run out of places to store them. Too many rockets, what a problem to have.
Given that they’ve returned cores for two very difficult GTO missions, I’d have to agree. LEO missions and lighter GTO missions should be easy in comparison.
I imagine they’re still exploring the flight envelope to some extent, and so taking some risks, but I’d be surprised if they RUD more than about two cores in the rest of the year.
Here is their warehouse containing the first three landed cores. They’ll have to start stacking them fairly soon now…
Perhaps re-entry structurally damaged them so that they cannot fly again.
Two out of three ain’t bad.
Details are sketchy, but the latest Falcon 9 first stage was lost
The video cut out, but it appeared to me that more flames than usual were there.
Brian
Elon confirmed first stage loss. It appears one of the landing boosters was not performing at max which caused a RUD on the drone ship.
If so that’s great for SpaceX too. Now they have data on what broke and in what way and they can work to fix it. Those first stages coming back intact, even if unsuitable for reuse, are win-win.
I love RUD(Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly) as a term. It’s like “surprise adoption” or “sneakernet”. They are so evocative.
Enjoy,
Steven
Bump for the next launch!
This one is scheduled to take off late tonight (12:45 AM EDT on Monday). It’ll be a launch of the Dragon to the ISS, followed by a landing attempt back at the launch site, rather than the barge landings we’ve seen recently. As usual, you can find all the relevant details on the /r/spacex launch thread.
Yes! Another successful landing. Too bad it’s nighttime again with the land landing… still waiting for a daytime shot of the rocket touching down at LZ1. But it still looked great!
Oh, and Dragon is successfully in orbit. Ho-hum :).
Check out the Technical Webcast. The landing has better camera angles than the Hosted Webcast. Also if you watch carefully as the 2nd stage lit off you can see the 1st stage burning away for the boost back burn fade off in the distance.
SpaceX has been doing a series of tests on the stage they launched and recovered on May 6. This was the booster that survived the harshest re-entry and landing conditions so far. Musk has stated that this stage will be extensively tested on the ground, as the “life leader” for the growing fleet of landed boosters.
They just released video of the first full-duration burn (150 seconds, same as what it does during a normal flight), and people near the testing site have reported hearing an additional ~150 sec burn the very next day.
Not quite as flashy as another launch and landing, but it shows how much testing and engineering is being done in preparation for the first launch of a re-used stage which might be later this year.
Since they have (5?) “only used by a little old lady on Sundays…” boosters, and not a bunch of market for same:
How about bolting three of them together and getting the “Falcon Heavy” flying?
(and, not to put too fine a point on it or anything, but: Sticking out your tongue at ULA and saying "Nyaa, Nyaa, I’m Better Than YOU! AND Your Russian Engines!)
Because Kerbal Space Program is not real life? 
SpaceX already has a customer for a reused F9. I expect they’ll get a lot more once they actually fly one.
They’re up to three full-duration burns at this point. I think they were shooting for 10. Pretty impressive durability, and it seems like it should give potential customers high confidence if their max-damage booster operates like new after a landing. These burns are also close enough together that they obviously aren’t doing much refurbishment between them.
Yeah, no way can they strap together three existing boosters. However, my understanding is that SpaceX ultimately hopes to have just two core variants total–a center core and a booster core. The center needs more reinforcement to handle side loads and the payload. The boosters can be more minimalistic. So it may ultimately be that a landed F9 core can be used as the center for a FH with just some bolt-on modifications. They aren’t there yet, though.
I still want them to launch a core to orbit with no payload or second stage. The math says it should just make it to LEO. First SSTO :).
