CatastrophicFailure

So... after what seemed like a slow day I just got a metric crap-tonne of forum emails all at once, that I’m still wading thru. Was the forum feeling a bit... irregular today, or might this digital constipation have been on my email server’s end?

I think you may have just set a new record. Moar is coming... eventually. It’s just crossed the 4100-word mark and still going, and is definitely going to need the patience skill of my editor(s).

This guy is a veritable font of useless fascinating information.

In other SpaceX news, HispaSat/TESS delayed. TESS NET April 16 now, I think.

@DAL59 there’s your answer, re: Kessler syndrome. That high an orbit is still “low” but puts them well above the ISS and most other LEO things. Not likely to decay quickly, either. Presumably the sats carry enough fuel to de-orbit or otherwise “safe” themselves at EOL. And if there is a breakdown, before we all go screaming “Kessler syndrome” let us not forget that space is big. Like, really, really big. And it effectively gets bigger the higher you go.

My dude. Listen to yourself. You cold take any of “those people” right to the moon and rub their noses right in the gunpowder-smelling regolith and they’d still swear it was all smoke and mirrors. Right before they disappeared in a puff of logic. Or just asphyxiated. One of those. If you’re in a nice, dark place you can already look up at any time and constantly see some satellite or bit of space junk fly past. I don’t think any of these new smallsats will come anywhere near the ISS in terms of brightness. Once you’ve seen that baby you wonder how you ever didn’t.

As it is, that many LEO birds with big, reflective solar panels are gonna be pretty obvious.

They’re going to launch dozens, maybe hundreds at a time. Eventually. These first two are just pathfinders to test things out. Also, IIRC the initial constellation is “only” going to be around 4000.

Glad you’re emjoying. You seem to be quite the speed reader too.

There sort of is. Over on the Don't Click This thread, someone once posted five megabytes of “click” and it was wreaking havoc with mobile users and crashing browsers. Speaking of such, does putting images in a Spoiler stop them from being loaded til the spoiler’s opened?

The same article gives the odds of actually hitting Earth within the next few million years as something like 6%, soooo.... I'm not exactly worried.

Hey if anyone wants to go pick the Roadster up, it’s possibly going to pass closer than the Moon in 2091.

Keep me posted... and record some video. Just chalk it up to maintaining historical accuracy. Those payouts tho!

If they’re acid-proof... does that mean they have acid for blood? After all, they are... aliens...

Brilliant! Absolutely not the way I would have done it (which is probably a good thing), hows the flex on that single docking port with the latest version?

Aaaaand of course I’m out of likes. Pthbthbt, there that is.

plat! there it is. er... do platypuses even make noise?

I... hadn’t considered that....

PLATYPEOPAAAAAAAAAL! dundundun dundundundun...

Pity no one bothered to tell NASA this ‘bout 40 years ago. I was thinking just a simple “refuel from a tank” thing just to demonstrate that it can be done. Naw, but even one cycle would be epic. Don’t think I’ve ever known anyone to do a full recovery and reuse in-game like that.

This part, at least, is easy. You’d just need a simple MM cfg to make SolidFuel transferable. I’ll ping @JadeOfMaar here since he’s more familiar with such. The fuel tank might be light enough, once empty, that it could survive reentry all on its own in stock. Maybe some fins for control. You’d just need a boat with a couple of Klaws to grab the boosters, would be a slow trip back tho.

Never thought I would ever hear that spoken on the Internet. Cool development, tho.

Do-able, fairly “easily,” if you use Infernal Robotics. A little harder with KAS. Possibly still doable in stock but would require ingenuity far beyond my snarky remarks. If you assemble everything with docking ports, that would at least make re-assembly possible, tho your craft would have to cycle back thru the VAB for a refit. I think the whole thing could be done, with IR, FMRS for landing the boosters, and a lot of patience. Whether you’d want to dump the time in, tho...

CAN'T. NOT. HEAR. IT. LIKE. THIS! PONY PEOPLE! Also: I have the strangest craving for a pink cookie from the coffee hut now... Not that it's in anyway related to this. I always have a craving for a pink cookie from the coffee hut. Yet another awesome "What will he do next?" chapter! And as usual... the plot thickens.

You keep up with all these pretty pictures and I’ma start poking you to create an entire (in-game) shuttle refurbishment system.