All posts tagged: spaceship system

We’re One Step Closer to Gas Stations in Space

We’re One Step Closer to Gas Stations in Space

Published by skeptic

SpaceX’s latest Starship mission flew further than before—and tested technology that could elevate humankind’s spacefaring status. Brandon Bell / Getty March 14, 2024, 11:50 AM ET SpaceX has once again launched the most powerful rocket in history into the sky, and this time, the mission seems to have passed most of its key milestones. Starship took off without a hitch this morning, separated from its booster, and cruised through space for a while before SpaceX lost contact with it. Instead of splashing down in the ocean as planned, Starship seems to have been destroyed during reentry in Earth’s atmosphere. The flight was the third try in an ambitious testing campaign that began less than a year ago. The other attempts started with beautiful liftoffs, but stopped short of completing test objectives and ended in explosions. For today’s test, SpaceX changed up its designs and applied them to freshly made Starship prototypes, which are manufactured at a pace that, compared with the rest of rocket history, evokes chocolates coming down the conveyor belt toward Lucille Ball. …

SpaceX Is Holding Up America’s Lunar Ambitions

SpaceX Is Holding Up America’s Lunar Ambitions

Published by skeptic

The second liftoff of Starship, SpaceX’s giant new rocket-and-spaceship system, went beautifully this morning, the fire of the engines matching the orange glow of the sunrise in South Texas. The spaceship soared over the Gulf Coast, with all 33 engines in the rocket booster pulsing. High in the sky, the vehicles separated seamlessly—through a technique that SpaceX debuted during this flight—and employees let out wild cheers. The booster soon exploded, but the flight could survive that. What mattered was that Starship was still flying. It could still coast along the edge of space, and then plunge back to Earth, crashing into the Pacific Ocean off of the coast of Hawaii, as SpaceX planned. But then, as SpaceX mission control waited to hear a signal from Starship, there was only silence. Something had gone wrong after the ship shut off its engines in preparation to coast. The self-destruct system kicked in, and Starship blew itself up, according to SpaceX’s commentators, who were narrating the livestream. A “rapid unscheduled disassembly,” as SpaceXers call it. SpaceX can certainly …