CatastrophicFailure

It literally is not, but I’m not going to sit here and argue semantics now. Moving on. Starlink update:

That isn’t at all what I said, you guys completely missed my point. But fine, agree to disagree. We’re just going in circles here.

What I meant was, as a starting point, such are the people who are most likely to, A: have the monetary means to do so, and B: are more willing to trade risk for something potentially awesome and experience-improving, especially if it’s from Musk.

The way I figure it, if they're charging ±business-class fare, the potential customer base is basically anyone who's bought a Tesla up until about now. For... obvious reasons. Nah, LA maybe... as far as an incoming ICBM is concerned, Seattle is a good hundred miles inland.

My friend, that is pure supposition. If Starship works, this becomes entirely plausible. Yet since they not only still exist, but have like the 11th best-selling car in the country, they have obviously been making progress with dealing with such regulations. Plus... Give ‘em another 10 or 15 years, which is likely how long it’ll take before Starship is remotely ready for P2P. They’re learning quickly. And those rules are likely to see drastic change in the next decade. I don’t have all the answers, Starship’s design is far from finalized as far as that goes. But that doesn’t mean the answer doesn’t exist, it just means I don’t have it. You seem to want all the answers and then some written down in stone right now. Why are you so resistant to even consider the possibility? I totally acknowledge this may never be a thing, but I’ve seen enough amazing stuff out of this outfit, and New Space in general, over the last few years that I’ll at least give them the benefit of the doubt, at least until there’s some concrete reason to think otherwise. You missed the part where I said “shaving 10 hours off...” A time savings of that magnitude might just make people a little more willing to rekajigger their travel plans across the world.

I just explained speculated on this. This was also mentioned upthread, somewhere between business and premium economy. Just for comparison, Tesla has been making great inroads dealing with the same kind of restrictions about car makers and car dealerships. They do, however, have quite a bit of experience navigating ITAR regulations and govt secrecy requirements. I think they know. I was dismissive until Shotwell got onboard and said, “yes, we’re really doing this.” That tells me they’re serious and they actually do have people busy thinking up solutions to these problems. First, Starship needs to be a success. None of this matters if that doesn’t work. But if it does, it’s going to be actually paradigm-changing. Commercial spaceflight in general is a big hot mess right now, and all parties involved are scrambling to rethink the rules. And it wasn’t that long ago that landing a booster on its tail and re-using it, multi-thousand satellite constellations, and autonomous cars all seemed laughable too. The world is changing.

Convenient, then, that Musk also has at his disposal a company that builds high-speed subterranean transit systems and a company that makes high-speed autonomous electric vehicles. Take your Tesla from home right to the basement of the launch tower (saving all the infrastructure to support enormous parking garages), then send it on its merry way. Carp about standing in line for security forever. Not even Musk could solve this one Then a quick up-n-down, and catch a robotaxi from the basement of the destination pad right to your hotel. Well, they could split the load with cargo, which is also common today. Or perhaps bring a resurgence of the hub-and-spoke system, even if that Starship only saves you 10 hours off a 15 hour trip, that’s still pretty dang significant. As a fat-S, I can personally attest that 3g for a few minutes while on your back is no more uncomfortable than for a lighter person...

Ooh! Ooh! I know this one! I know this one!

So... you’re saying he’s not an OG?

Spelling has never been my strong pint.

Fins that can fold up...

This is, perhaps, not the best phrasing to win hearts and minds...

Well, this is interesting... Color me skeptical... Wasn’t Nakua supposed to be up there last decade?

That took me a while...

B1057’s last transmission:

This is how it went down: Computer pulled a Noble Sacrifice:

Maybe they use the engine to gain more separation from the descent module? Assuming the SM is equipped with a probe core...

Yup, that went sideways, alright. In more ways than one.

Replay-ola!

Well... at least it looked like it was going alot slower than the first one... Curious to hear the after-action on what went wrong.

Awww, man.

Y'arnt!

Now 2:30 eastern/11:30 pacific. Well... so much for getting to bed on time... *pokes @Geonovast with a stick*

There is no shame in a well-timed nap. Now I’ll actually be fully home for it! but a nap does sound nice...

Sure you can. It’s Falcon Heavy, after all.