Space In General

[CodeRedR51]

I think the 12 foot waves were working against them.

 

[Dennisch]

What's the reasoning to have it land on the ship?

Cut the losses and keep it on dry land.

 

[CodeRedR51]

I think it's standby in case they can't land it back on dry land for some reason. And as far as I am aware, they don't have a landing area on the west coast just yet.

 

[CodeRedR51]

 

[wfooshee]

RUD. They made an acronym out of it!!!!

That's kinda funny, and kinda sad, both.

 

[CodeRedR51]

Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly I believe. I think they can be joke around about it since they are really not losing much considering the booster would have been ruined anyway if they had just dumped it back into the ocean per normal procedure. They'll make sure the leg lockout issue doesn't happen again and move on.

Edit: It was damn near dead center on the drone ship too. Shame.



Edit 2: Video thanks to Mr Musk.

 

[m8h3r]

Regardless of the fact it fell over watching that thing land was incredible. Best of luck to SpaceX with the next one.

 

[CodeRedR51]

Eh, I consider that a landing. It did what it was supposed to do, it landed just fine and if that arm was locked into place like it should have been, it would still be standing upright. Apparently ice may have been the issue, with the fog on takeoff being the root cause.

 

[CAMAROBOY69]

First flower grown in space. Real life "The Martian".
http://my.xfinity.com/video/astrona...603907139833/Comcast/TopVideos?cid=sf_vidtray

 

[TenEightyOne]

First flower grown in space. Real life "The Martian".
http://my.xfinity.com/video/astrona...603907139833/Comcast/TopVideos?cid=sf_vidtray

US-only, I think, whatever Comcast is. Here's the flower in l'Independent.

 

[Thematic]

Then again, http://nasawatch.com/archives/2016/01/no-nasa-these-a.html

 

[TenEightyOne]

Then again, http://nasawatch.com/archives/2016/01/no-nasa-these-a.html

Good spot, apparently not the first. The article itself is incorrect though (terrible English aside), it says that NASA are claiming this as the first but casts doubt on the whole episode by saying it's not on their website. Both of those things are wrong. That gets even odder when you read the link they provide for NASA's own experiments with Arabidopsis in space in the 80s. I think they just hate NASA

 

[Thematic]

That gets even odder when you read the link they provide for NASA's own experiments with Arabidopsis in space in the 80s.

The abstract for the study or experiment is interesting even though I'm no botanist.

 

[Dennisch]

Evidence for planet IX?

Abstract
Recent analyses have shown that distant orbits within the scattered disk population of the Kuiper Belt exhibit an unexpected clustering in their respective arguments of perihelion. While several hypotheses have been put forward to explain this alignment, to date, a theoretical model that can successfully account for the observations remains elusive. In this work we show that the orbits of distant Kuiper Belt objects (KBOs) cluster not only in argument of perihelion, but also in physical space. We demonstrate that the perihelion positions and orbital planes of the objects are tightly confined and that such a clustering has only a probability of 0.007% to be due to chance, thus requiring a dynamical origin. We find that the observed orbital alignment can be maintained by a distant eccentric planet with mass

10 m⊕ whose orbit lies in approximately the same plane as those of the distant KBOs, but whose perihelion is 180° away from the perihelia of the minor bodies. In addition to accounting for the observed orbital alignment, the existence of such a planet naturally explains the presence of high-perihelion Sedna-like objects, as well as the known collection of high semimajor axis objects with inclinations between 60° and 150° whose origin was previously unclear. Continued analysis of both distant and highly inclined outer solar system objects provides the opportunity for testing our hypothesis as well as further constraining the orbital elements and mass of the distant planet.

 

[wfooshee]

So this thing [that might be] out there is so far away that the orbit of Neptune is the only one they can draw in scale, right at the very teeny middle of the image, was probably formed, then spewed, during the early days of the solar system's formation. It wasn't spewed hard enough, though, so it didn't actually get away, and now sits in an oblong tilted orbit, playing shepherd to other incredibly distant objects. It's at least ten times as far away as Neptune...... People are amazed at the distance to Pluto, with signals from New Horizons spending 4 or 5 hours to get here. How about a full light-day???

Sometimes, space is just:

But if Pluto can't be considered a planet, then neither can this, despite its size! Its apparent orbit is not near the ecliptic plane and too far from circular, and it doesn't follow the spacing rule (each planet is about 1.5 to 2 times the distance from the sun as the one inside it. Mars and Jupiter fit that if you call the asteroid belt a planetary orbit.) So I cannot allow it to be called a planet. (I'll post a petition shortly.)

 

[Dennisch]

Isn't it so that a floating orb is a planet when it orbits a star and clear its path of any nasty space rocks, unlike Pluto, which is just part of many tiny floaty orbs in the Kuiperbelt?

 

[tarnheld]

On planet IX:

The evidence is that six of the of the most distant know Kuiper Belt Objects have orbits that line up in a way that would only happen if the gravity of a massive, unknown planet where pulling on them

While observational bias does preferentially select objects with perihelia (where they are closest and brightest) at the heavily observed ecliptic, no possible bias could select only for objects moving from south to north. Recent simulations (de la Fuente Marcos & de la Fuente Marcos 2014) confirmed this lack of bias in the observational data. The clustering in ω therefore appears to be real.

Therefore, we further confirm that the clustering in ω
pointed out by Trujillo & Sheppard (2014) is real, not the result of
observational bias. Unfortunately, the number of known objects is
small (13), see Table 1, and any conclusions obtained from them
will be statistically fragile

Love the part where they "confirm" lack of bias in data with a monte carlo simulation.

 

[Team THRT Drift]

Question...

A solar cycle is a periodic 11-year change in the Sun's activity. Easily depicted through the observation of sunspots.

So, there's this huge discussion about global warming, but, scientists have reported that this cycle has been one of the weakest solar cycles in history which brings up the point of what's to come. Since this has been the weakest cycle, it has been suggested that the next decade will be the coldest. However our temperatures are rising rapidly.

So is this the calm before the storm? Besides crippling human activity, what might be going on?

 

[CodeRedR51]

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

Question...

A solar cycle is a periodic 11-year change in the Sun's activity. Easily depicted through the observation of sunspots.

So, there's this huge discussion about global warming, but, scientists have reported that this cycle has been one of the weakest solar cycles in history which brings up the point of what's to come. Since this has been the weakest cycle, it has been suggested that the next decade will be the coldest. However our temperatures are rising rapidly.

So is this the calm before the storm? Besides crippling human activity, what might be going on?

That's a better question for the actual thread that it should be asked in, which is the climate change thread. Cause the next question I would pose to you, is what statistical probability points to an increase between the last five years and the five years before that, and the predicted next five years up until the point of the new cycle and blah blah blah blah. Which would require you to put a lot of data forth that has nothing to do with this thread.

tldr; ask the climate thread you'll get a better answer or even find one already 👍

 

[tarnheld]

So, there's this huge discussion about global warming, but, scientists have reported that this cycle has been one of the weakest solar cycles in history which brings up the point of what's to come. Since this has been the weakest cycle, it has been suggested that the next decade will be the coldest. However our temperatures are rising rapidly.

The 11 year solar cycle affects mostly magnetic activity, not so much solar energy output. The yearly variation of solar irradiance (energy arriving at earth) due to varying earth-sun distance is about 50 times higher than the variation measured during a solar cycle. For details see Solar Constant.

 

[Dotini]

The 11 year solar cycle affects mostly magnetic activity, not so much solar energy output. The yearly variation of solar irradiance (energy arriving at earth) due to varying earth-sun distance is about 50 times higher than the variation measured during a solar cycle. For details see Solar Constant.

True. But, the magnetic activity is thought to affect cloud cover, which in turn affects insolation and temperature of the surface.

 

[tarnheld]

True. But, the magnetic activity is thought to affect cloud cover, which in turn affects insolation and temperature of the surface.

I just read a bit about that the suns magnetism shields the earth from cosmic rays and that cosmic rays might contribute to cloud formation. It's an interesting thought but when considering the factors of cloud formation (temperature, pressure, air composition, etc.) it seems cosmic rays play only a minor role. I mean, in the CLOUD experiments at CERN they reported 10 times more nucleation particles when hitting air with cosmic ray like particles, but why do you need these when other nucleation particles in greater abundance are available in normal air? All the correlations of cosmic ray flux and various earth temperatures (for example by Svensmark) cannot convince me if there is no clear physical mechanism.

 

[wfooshee]

Blue Origin has re-used their booster and crew capsule, returned to "space" and again recovered both parts of the vehicle. "Space" is in quotes because they reached the altitude vertically, with no downrange travel, and being useful in getting to space means orbit. Still, is anybody going to say that the X-15 was a wasted resource? That project reached 50 miles more than a dozen times, and 100km (officially, space) twice.

The argument in November, when they landed the booster the first time, was that it shouldn't count, as it wasn't an orbital mission. While I agreed then (and still do) that the mission profile of straight up and straight down amounts to a very expensive carnival ride, the fact remains that they landed their booster on its own rocket first, and now have reused and recovered the same booster first.

The statement appears in their video, "Our vision: millions of people living and working in space. You can't get there by throwing the hardware away." Well, you can't get there without going into orbit, either, but perhaps the less lofty vertical profile serves as a better test bed. Get that basic piece of work done and move up from there.

Space-X's work is the actual launching of payloads, and the landing of the booster is something they're trying to add to that mission while they do the other work. It's simply a different philosophy.

The fact remains, Blue Origin landed their booster first, and now they've reused the booster first. Not to orbit, but still, first.

https://www.blueorigin.com/news/blog/launch-land-repeat

 

[CodeRedR51]

In all honesty, what Blue Origin has done is cool and all, but it's certainly multiple times harder to launch a rocket several miles down range, split it in two, make the 1st stage do an about face from supersonic speeds, bring it back to near the launch pad, and land it safely. And something entirely different to do the same thing but land it on a small barge in the ocean in 12ft waves.

Respect to the Blue team, but SpaceX has them beat, I don't care who was first.

 

[wfooshee]

How did I know you'd be back for this????

I think you're missing my point completely. It's a different engineering approach. Nobody at Blue Origin has said, "This is going to launch payloads into orbit." As far as a working spacecraft, their current profile has no use whatsoever.

The thing is, engineering-wise, I think their effort is smarter. "Let's shoot something up and bring it back, like a proof-of-concept, and when we get it working, we'll build on that." It's baby steps, so to speak.

SpaceX is trying to retro-engineer a working booster into a returning, reusable booster, pretty much as a side project to actually doing paying missions of payload delivery into orbit. Blue Origin is working on what it takes to make a returning booster, and hopefully then scale that into a useful booster. I think their approach, not biting off so much at once, is smarter, an appropriate application of the K.I.S.S. principle. Make a lander, then make it maneuverable, then make it stronger.

"SpaceX has them beat." Why? How? It does not fit with the engineering or the results. Their booster is more useful, but it has not been shown to be recoverable or reusable. It's supposed to be, but that's not been shown. Blowing up boosters that almost made it back is not successful engineering. It's successful navigation, but the end result is no different than dumping the booster into the ocean like we've been doing since 1958. If SpaceX wants to engineer a better booster, they'd be flying more of them as booster tests, with or without actual paid missions. SpaceX has yet to demonstrate that any of their engineering for recovering the booster works reliably. How is that better?

The concept is better, in that a reusable booster for orbital missions would be better than a booster for a carnival ride, but the engineering isn't working.

Blue Origin has launched and landed a booster. Twice. The same booster, with the same payload capsule. They've demonstrated recoverability and reusability. SpaceX has recovered one booster (out of how many?) and reused zero.

 

[CodeRedR51]

Let's not forget that SpaceX was grounded for what, half a year? I'm sure they would be a lot further along right now if they hadn't been. And why waste money launching rockets for no reason other than to see if you can land it? Then you end up possibly ruining more rockets during testing than just attaching the landing test to an actual mission like they are currently doing. That landing last week? It was a landing. The thing guided in and landed on that barge perfectly. Mechanical issue aside that happened after the landing is a different story. So far they are 2 for 2 since returning from being grounded IMO. And while doing everything I said in my previous post, while being way more impressive.

We all know Mr Musk. He goes all or nothing when it comes to his projects. I don't think he even knows the KISS principle, and I'm ok with that. Go big or go home. SpaceX launches and/or landings are typically watched live, and the news spreads quick. Blue Origin? Oh they did it yesterday but it only made news today. Ho hum.

 

[wfooshee]

Grounded why? Oh, they blew up somebody's payload.

2 for 2???? Really? Since returning to flight, yes, but they've tried FOUR landings, and have only kept ONE booster intact. This is EXACTLY why they should fly some test missions, to work out the issues they're having.

What happened after the landing on that last one is not "a different story." Suppose the Apollo 11 lander had folded a leg on reaching the moon, perhaps destroying the lander, but at least trapping the two astronauts with no hope of leaving the surface..... "Well, yeah, but they landed, so it worked!"

It isn't "way more impressive" until it works. So far, it hasn't worked.

I'm not saying Blue Origin is a better package than SpaceX. I'm saying their process is better, and so far, more successful. The Wright Brothers didn't carry passengers from Kitty Hawk to Charlotte, they flew a straight line for a distance that fits inside a modern airliner. I don't think anyone said, "Well, that's not very impressive!"

Make it work, THEN see what you can do with it.

 

[BobK]

And why waste money launching rockets for no reason other than to see if you can land it?

If you'd try rereading @wfooshee's post, you'd find that he explained exactly why.

 

[Thematic]

Actually it can be quite simple, that is, SpaceX avoiding unnecessary launches. Because as it stands, no mechanism is in place to undo the CO2 footprint for example.