It was launched on Good Friday, and now the Dragon has berthed with the ISS early in the morning on Easter Sunday, over the region of the world in which Christ was reportedly born, died, and resurrected. That wasn’t planned, though. They’d have preferred to have it up weeks earlier.
Meanwhile, no word from SpaceX about recovering the first stage. I’m going to interpret that as bad news, for now.
What happened to “no news is good news?”
Every time they’ve had good news on this front, they’ve provided it. The last tweet we saw was that they were heading to the landing zone in heavy seas. Nothing since.
A booster is a pretty fragile structure and given the sea state its not surprising.
Don’t forget that Elon loses interest in Twitter after the third tweet most of the time anyway. So either way we’d probably hear nothing.
Yeah. However I expected to hear something by now. Oh well. Perhaps when Dragon reenters.
No matter what they’ve already had the good news. They reached sea level with an intact booster and hovered. That means they could have touchdown on land perhaps as well. This is game over time for the competition regardless of recovery. They plan to do another sea test but I don’t see why they don’t try for land on the next attempt.
There’s actually a long way to go until this translates into economic success. There’s really no reason to assume it’s all over, yet.
Compared to the development time for any aerospace project? No, there’s very little time. Especially since in order to compete with SpaceX everyone else needs new vehicles. Sure, there’s a lot of time between now and when SpaceX owns the launch market, but the time between now and when that die is cast is not very long at all.
Well, of course you are right Trent, but the writing is certainly on the wall.
Give it a week or so and someone will report an unusual object floating off the UK. Drifted with the Gulf Stream. Unless the Rooskys go collect it first.
As far as an attempt to return to dry land they have to get past the FAA. If they don’t allow toy UAVs with cameras I can sure see the FAA going Ape Sheet over a 20 story rocket with flames blazing landing anywhere.
That is some of what SpaceX will be doing in NM soon – trying to get the FAA to go along with landing a Falcon 1st stage during the next NASCAR Race at Dayton.
Landing at a NASCAR race at Daytona? Now that would be cool!
Nope, more likely it will would at White Sands Space Harbor. That is the great thing about the site that was selected for Spaceport America, the corridors for launch to major orbits have downrange options for booster recovery which the FAA will have no issues with. They were mapped out by the SRS Task Force in the 1990’s when the DC-X was being offered as one of the X-33 options. Instead of having to accomplish all the X-33 objectives in one flight it would been possible to test the DC-Y/X-33 incrementally.
BTW the return for orbit corridors were similar to the ones that were used to fire IRBM into WSMR from the Green River Test Annex in Utah should SpaceX decide to bring the Dragon down on land.
We can expect others to ‘compete’ with SpaceX by this means. I hate when you are right Thomas.
If they do not want to land on terra firma on a prepared pad they could do like some old SSTO proposals and land the thing on some lake in Florida or elsewhere.
Rand, try to keep up.
Christ (meaning the “Annointed One” as in the custom of pouring a bottle of olive oil over the head of someone made the king) was reportedly born on Christmas Day, December 25. This is a big “reportedly” on account of calendar reforms and the proximity to a pagan Solstice Day celebration and the practice of some Christians of encouraging pagans (such as my distant ancestors) to keep their celebrations but to celebrate Christ instead of their pagan deity.
Christ died on Good Friday. There is a pretty good basis for this day on account of his Last Supper being a Jewish Seder commemorating Passover.
Christ is believed by the faithful, both by persons in his “inner circle” of followers, that would be Peter and James and John the sons of Zebedee, as well as by many others “in the day” as well as in our day, to have been bodily removed from the tomb by supernatural agency some time overnight, for said persons to find the tomb empty early Sunday morning. These samed persons “back in the day” had encounters with Christ in his resurrected state for the next 40 days. Many Christians regard these next 40 days as being part of Easter, followed by the Assumption, when these encounters giving the disciples instruction and some deserved scoldings (Peter, mainly) ceased, which is followed by Pentecost (Greek for the 50th day), where by supernatural agency according to Christian belief, Peter, especially, and the other followers stopped being fearful and became bold to the point of their own martyrdom.
Birth, death, and resurrection, you are talking Christmas, Good Friday, and the Easter Vigil.
What was the sea state, exactly? I’ve heard 20 foot *swells*, which might be quite survivable. I’ve been at sea in small yachts, and even solo in a 14 foot racing sailboat, in swells that size. If it’s just a base swell, it’s not much of an issue (major caveat to follow). But, if it’s a breaking swell (whitecaps) that’s another matter entirely; the force if just a couple of feet of breaking water is a lot. I’ve seen just a two foot wave face, hit at just the wrong angle, crack hull fiberglass. I’ve also had a surfboard (which are fairly tough) snapped in two by just a seven foot wave.
Now, for the major caveat; even if it’s just swells and no whitecaps of any sort, the wavelength fetch (distance between swell peaks) might be very important here. That first stage is about 225 feet long as I recall, and it’s very, very light relative to volume. So, it’s like balsa wood- it’ll float high in the water. That means it has a significant sail area, plus the drag of the legs. I can’t fogure out if it’d float side-on to the swells, or tail-on to them, assuming the wind direction and swell direction are the same (they often aren’t). If the stage is floating with the legs toward the swell, it’ll end up (due to surface curvature between swells) supported at each end but not in the middle. This, plus a bit of wave-imparted abuse, could well be enough to break it. Further, in that area, you often get a confused sea state; swells from more than one direction, compounded by differing wind and current direction. The area between Florida and the Bahamas is notorious for it (And the stage came down not all that far from that area).
My guess… Rand has it right that no news is bad news. My further guess is that SpaceX doesn’t know for sure, which is why the silence.
Still, even if the first stage is never seen again, the soft splashdown plus the successful docking (their third) are momentous steps.
If there ever was a case for kamikaze fleet of quadcopters to fly in on a suicide mission to film the landing, this was the occasion.
There are a bunch of fuel cell powered UAV projects that would have been able to do this, launched at a safe range
If I had to guess, I’d say that the next time SpaceX attempts to to soft land a stage, they’ll attempt a partial flyback towards the launch site with a precise touchdown location. This will let them systematically advance their technology and experience towards a touchdown on land at a specified location. They may have to demonstrate a precision landing more than once before the powers that be (FAA, etc.) give then the clearance to attempt a dry landing. With a precise landing location, it’ll be easier to video the approach, most likely from manned airplanes. NASA wanted to send a P-3 Orion to observe this landing attempt to study igniting a rocket engine at supersonic speeds into the airflow (useful for landing on Mars) but didn’t due to icing conditions.
Friend if mine who used to be at SpaceX posted to Facebook that the Coast Guard may have found it.
Intact?
“According to L2 sources, SpaceX recruited the US Navy to head out and try and find the stage for potential recovery. However, as of Tuesday, no definitive updates have been posted as to the success of this effort, pointing to the potential the stage has succumb to the rough seas.
A US Coast Guard alert has noted a 150 foot long rocket booster was adrift in the ocean, as a hazard report. However, it is unclear as to how up to date this information is, with the warning since expiring without being updated.
If stage is recovered, it won’t be returning to Port Canaveral, instead the plan – per sources – was for it to be towed back to Charleston in South Carolina.”
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2014/04/rockets-return-home-spacex-pushing-boundaries/