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Condolences to Elon Musk, we have all been there


Rocket Farmer

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Didn't SpaceX recently lease one of the launch pads at Kennedy Space Center, and are converting it into a landing pad? I'm certain the barge system is only temporary to prove the precision of the rocket to have convinced NASA and the US Gov't to allow the landing at the pad, since it is on US soil. Or I could also see the barge being used as an off shore landing site for say, Virginia based launches, assuming SpaceX has contracts that extend to that facility.

Regardless, the barge should be engineered to fit a system to help ''capture'' the rocket and assist with the landing. Perhaps the barge could be lowered in the center, akin to the design of a deep dish pizza crust, with a wire/rope system in place to net or enclose the rocket's four landing struts beneath it, running off a hydraulic, or even gas powered explosive deployment for quickly securing the rocket down.

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It was close to succeeding. Vertical landing has been the hardest thing I have had to learn to do in KSP. IMHO there was too much correction needed at too late a stage for that landing. I also have to wonder at the stability of a floating platform, since its is going to magnify any imbalance in the craft rather than resist it like solid floor would.

Don't feel bad your rocket fell over. Just the other day I had Jeb standing on a rock giving his now inverted Duna lander a dirty look. It happens to all of us.

Like the rest of us it's back to the drawing board. Maybe try parachutes next time or more boosters.

Did he not try the old flying the craft on its side, up a hill, full burn and flip upright with the aid of landing gear ploy Rocket Farmer? Works... sometimes. Wouldn't recommend it for SpaceX or NASA though!

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Didn't SpaceX recently lease one of the launch pads at Kennedy Space Center, and are converting it into a landing pad? I'm certain the barge system is only temporary to prove the precision of the rocket to have convinced NASA and the US Gov't to allow the landing at the pad, since it is on US soil. Or I could also see the barge being used as an off shore landing site for say, Virginia based launches, assuming SpaceX has contracts that extend to that facility.

They're currently lobbying to receive permission to try a landing on said landing pad.

Tentatively, there's a launch in July of NASA satellite Jason-3 from Vandenberg (where they also have leased a landing pad) for which there's a non-zero chance that this request might indeed be granted. Before then, there's also CRS flight 7 in June out of Cape Canaveral, but that's more likely to also be a barge landing.

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They're currently lobbying to receive permission to try a landing on said landing pad.

Tentatively, there's a launch in July of NASA satellite Jason-3 from Vandenberg (where they also have leased a landing pad) for which there's a non-zero chance that this request might indeed be granted. Before then, there's also CRS flight 7 in June out of Cape Canaveral, but that's more likely to also be a barge landing.

As I understand it, the FAA is refusing to give them a permit to land it on land until they can prove reliably they can land it, hence the need for a barge in the middle of the ocean. As other posters have said, the FAA doesn't want debris raining down on populated areas if something goes wrong. Look what happened when Columbia broke up on re-entry: it left a trail of debris from New Mexico to Louisiana with most of it landing in Texas.

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The FAA wants them to be reliably within the constraints of the landing zone so that they, indeed, do not drop stuff on people.

On the last three consecutive attempts, SpaceX was within 20 meters of the target; on the last wo, within 10 meters. Considering the landing pads have mile-wide exclusion zones around them, that is easily enough accuracy. And if the rocket explodes on touchdown... well, SpaceX is leasing the pad. It's their job to fix it. Not that fixing a couple dozen square meters of plain concrete is hard. :P

The thing about Jason-3 isn't speculation of mine... This is the actual plan forward. Nothing confirmed yet, of course, but the rumors are rumoring rather very consistently. (It's possible that the final decision will be made after observing the landing attempt of CRS flight 7.)

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The FAA wants them to be reliably within the constraints of the landing zone so that they, indeed, do not drop stuff on people.

On the last three consecutive attempts, SpaceX was within 20 meters of the target; on the last wo, within 10 meters. Considering the landing pads have mile-wide exclusion zones around them, that is easily enough accuracy. And if the rocket explodes on touchdown... well, SpaceX is leasing the pad. It's their job to fix it. Not that fixing a couple dozen square meters of plain concrete is hard. :P

The thing about Jason-3 isn't speculation of mine... This is the actual plan forward. Nothing confirmed yet, of course, but the rumors are rumoring rather very consistently. (It's possible that the final decision will be made after observing the landing attempt of CRS flight 7.)

You're assuming that it would successfully land.

If something goes wrong the system isn't going to know that it is going wrong and be able to correct it. Well, within certain degrees. It is usually that slight oversight, like cutting off the fuel supply to a rocket engine, that results in a catastrophe. So, what if it hits land at an angle, while still going on its burn, and gets sent to civilization because the systems didn't account for the scenario? I mean, even shrapnel can be hurled for miles with enough energy behind the blast.

The question should never be "is it good enough", but "can I live with 1000 human deaths on my hands if this goes wrong" and ALWAYS that. As engineers, we always think we have every contingency accounted for; (or know we don't because corporate wanted us to cut costs); but we are gigantic children. We aren't the ones who think about all the possible consequences, we aren't the ones who the public will blame if things go wrong. We don't consider the potential impact on the lives of billions of people... we just play! Build, create, be innovative and figure out what we can do with new knowledge.

I personally think it would land fine, but staking the lives of other people on it? I can greatly understand and appreciate the FAA's position, how much money is a person's life worth? If something could have been uncovered in testing, but wasn't because it was "good enough" could you live with yourself... say it was just an accident. THEY have the hard job, they have to be ADULTS, to think about consequences... we get to be CHILDREN, letting our imaginations pour out into creation.

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That's it. I find it absolutely amazing how fast the rocket reacts to stabilize and touch down. It might have been blown by the wind (5 bft from the waves) after touchdown and during final approach; windspeed and direction change drastically in the layer above the ground due to friction with the sirface. But i'm shure they know what dynamic forces (wind, movement of the barge from the waves, still some impulse from the engines or whatever) applied in the situation.

If the barge could move steadily downwind and along the waves that'll could make things easier during and after touchdown, but probably more complicated for the final approach, but they know all that. I'm just ... totally ... mindblown ....

... but , well amazing performance nevertheless !

If only i could do that in KSP ..

K

Also note how the ass end gets blown downwind as soon as the landing legs (sails) get deployed, and the stabilization takes over in an attempt to recover, which is almost did.

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They're getting really close. Why are they landing on a barge, though? Why not the middle of nowhere, on solid ground, where it would be easier to land? I suppose the cleanup after a failed landing, but still...

Because rockets launch East, and East of KSC is the ocean. KSC was built specifically on the East coast so that rocket bits would fall into the ocean instead of on people.

The first stage naturally comes down approx 300 km East of the launch site. If you want to bring it back to the launch site, you're going to have to perform an RTLS (return to launch site) burn that reverses the trajectory to send it 300 km back, which of course is going to cost much more propellant and therefore a larger mass penalty. This is something that nobody has done yet, and they need to master the precision of the burn by landing in the ocean before attempting a real RTLS. They don't want the rocket to land in the middle of the KSC Visitor Center or a rocket fuel factory.

Edited by Nibb31
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