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1 minute ago, sevenperforce said:

This is my first time seeing any humans launch to space from US soil. I never watched any of the Shuttle launches...wasn't interested or aware of space growing up.

Wow. My mom was a space nut. She apparently sat me up from birth watching Gemini flights. I later got her autographs from a few astronauts (from her era) when I met them.

Also, on the SN4 issue:

 

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As of this writing, the ground track display on the live feed shows Dragon to be just over 500km behind the ISS. It seems to be gaining on the ISS at a rate of about 100km per orbit at the moment. So (very) roughly 60 km/h closure rate.  

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Family and I saw it fly overhead a few minutes ago. Went out to watch ISS, didn't think I'd see Endeavor. Saw a dim speck trailing 40? Maybe 60 degrees behind the station. Maybe it was something else, but it looked to be going the same speed and in the same direction. 

Coolest thing I've ever seen in my life. 

Edited by Jaelommiss
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23 minutes ago, Jaelommiss said:

Family and I saw it fly overhead a few minutes ago. Went out to watch ISS, didn't think I'd see Endeavor. Saw a dim speck trailing 40? Maybe 60 degrees behind the station. Maybe it was something else, but it looked to be going the same speed and in the same direction. 

Coolest thing I've ever seen in my life. 

Others have seen it, nice job. Raining here :(

I saw cargo Dragon behind ISS a few years ago, and it was awesome.

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51 minutes ago, cubinator said:

I saw the Station and Endeavor just now from Minnesota! Very nice to see in person the awesome ship with Bob and Doug safely inside, soon to arrive at the magnificent Station.

Raining here. I'm content to sit on my couch and re-watch the 2019 documentary "Apollo 11".

(Edit: 0:23:00 - I could watch that again and again... Now that was a rocket!)

Edited by PakledHostage
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3 hours ago, tater said:

Wow. My mom was a space nut. She apparently sat me up from birth watching Gemini flights. I later got her autographs from a few astronauts (from her era) when I met them.

My two-year-old sat with me and watched the launch and then went outside and waved to the ISS and to Dragon as they went over before she fell asleep.

3 hours ago, tater said:

Also, on the SN4 issue:

 

Sounds like we were right about it being GSE.

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29 minutes ago, sevenperforce said:

Sounds like we were right about it being GSE.

There are things I like about SpaceX methodology, and other times all I can think is, "Why didn't they pay a little more attention to X?"

The GSE seems like low-hanging fruit, though I suppose if they have to keep it at the bottom (starting from go with the tail-end refilling), it's going to be non-trivial with launch forces...

Actually, SS is a bit of a unicorn for ground launches I suppose. This only happens with test flights. SH can load tanks from umbilicals up on the side, away from all those engines. I suppose for testing they could alter SS to feed props up the side as well, but then they'd be testing a variant.

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If only you guys could see the crazy ****storm happening right now in Russian social media after this launch and Elon’s comment about trampoline. People from all political sides bashing Rogozin and Roscosmos for incompetence. My entire feed turned into space experts’ battleground. Looks like Elon has much more support here than I thought.

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11 minutes ago, sh1pman said:

If only you guys could see the crazy ****storm happening right now in Russian social media after this launch and Elon’s comment about trampoline. People from all political sides bashing Rogozin and Roscosmos for incompetence. My entire feed turned into space experts’ battleground. Looks like Elon has much more support here than I thought.

Post a few tweets, I want to watch the show :D

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12 minutes ago, sh1pman said:

Looks like Elon has much more support here than I thought.

Would be interesting to see Russia's commercial space program ! Everyone is slowly getting on it - ESA has Airbus, JAXA mostly have the various Japanese companies with Mitsubishi providing the heavy launch. I know the Russian LV provider is commercial - but would be interesting to see something being developed from the ground up commercially. (unless Angara is a whole lot more commercial than I thought !)

 

Anyway :

Does anyone know how exactly Dragon's autonomous docking works ? Is it like GPS-based or something ? The Russians has got big antennas and stuff, but this one seems a lot more lean. Is it like the Shuttle system that use LIDAR or like whatever they have on the ISS that allows berthing or ?

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7 minutes ago, RealKerbal3x said:

Post a few tweets, I want to watch the show :D

Probably not the right thread for it, but here’s one example. See replies (I think there’s a translate option)

 

5 minutes ago, YNM said:

I know the Russian LV provider is commercial - but would be interesting to see something being developed from the ground up commercially. (unless Angara is a whole lot more commercial than I thought !)

Nothing competitive with Falcon 9 or Starship, that’s for sure.

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Just now, sh1pman said:

Nothing competitive with Falcon 9 or Starship, that’s for sure.

Well in the past you had definitely open up if any billionaires are interested in getting to space... so to be fair, Soyuz is ahead on that aspect.

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10 hours ago, sevenperforce said:

This is my first time seeing any humans launch to space from US soil. I never watched any of the Shuttle launches...wasn't interested or aware of space growing up.

I had watched a variety of shuttle launches as a kid, but my first memory of one was a cold Tuesday morning in 1986, I was home sick from school. 

 

Anyways.....  Back to happier times.....    

I dunno if I'm more excited for the docking or for the launch!

It's really cool when you get the ISS within physics range.   I came late into the live stream, was there a lot of lag when it loaded?

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1 hour ago, Gargamel said:

I came late into the live stream, was there a lot of lag when it loaded?

Dunno, it is kinda laggy on the stream from here but that has been the case for everything on internet.

 

Seems like docking might be expedited ?

Edited by YNM
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48 minutes ago, Gargamel said:

It's really cool when you get the ISS within physics range.   I came late into the live stream, was there a lot of lag when it loaded?

It wasn't so bad at first, but every new module they added increased the part count. It's starting to be a problem.

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1 hour ago, Gargamel said:

I had watched a variety of shuttle launches as a kid, but my first memory of one was a cold Tuesday morning in 1986, I was home sick from school. 

 

Anyways.....  Back to happier times.....    

I dunno if I'm more excited for the docking or for the launch!

It's really cool when you get the ISS within physics range.   I came late into the live stream, was there a lot of lag when it loaded?

As long as when it gets in physics range it starts wobbling like a deranged octopus.

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10 minutes ago, mikegarrison said:

every new module they added increased the part count.

When they launch the new Russian modules it'll only get worse then...

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So wait, the Docking with ISS takes hours?

Bah! In KSP, my ships make a MechJeb rendezvous at 100m with a quick burn as they fly by the station a hundreds of m/s. Then magical magnets point both docking ports at each other, and we dock in 10-20 seconds or so.

Clearly the Astronauts need to play more KSP.

Edited by westamastaflash
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