Close as I can get:
Posted on 05/29/2020 1:17:45 PM PDT by amorphous
SpaceX's latest Starship prototype exploded just after an engine test Friday, erupting in a dramatic fireball at the spaceflight company's South Texas proving grounds.
The Starship SN4 prototype exploded shortly before 2 p.m. CDT (3 p.m. EDT) at SpaceX's test facility near Boca Chica, Texas according to a video provided by the South Padre Island tourism site SPadre.com. The explosion occurred about a minute after a short test of its Raptor rocket engine, but it was unclear what caused the conflagration.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
SN4 did have Tesla batteries and even the motor mounted on it, IIRC.
OK, that went well..........
If I spelled it correctly folks here would know I dint post it
more like the mass simulator went 20 meters...
during static fireing something flew off
2 minutes later venting from bottom of SN4 then BOOM
Ustah go to a dive bar along the Indian River up by Bellwood just S of T ville just before that causeway that went out to the Space Center.
N of the Hi Way Inn(another clay joint) by the FPL power plant
Had a name like the Pad 49 B or some such thing.
Great place to view the launches and get hammered
Close enough to 150', since it was already that far AGL. Plus, many seconds after the explosion you can see what looks like a piece of pipe land in the foreground, which had to travel farther than 150' given the time between the explosion and impact. Source of ignition was most certainly the the flare stack.
I think you’re right about parts of SN4 making the 150m hop. However, when the Nasa Spaceflight guys did a frame by frame, you can see that there is already flame under the skirt, that propagates outward to the flame stack. The stack is actually further away than it looks.
I ran a bit further South. Melbourne and Satellite Beach. Often watched a launch on the TV, then went out to the front yard to see the bird actually go up.
Elon said that they were going to replace the stack with a solar powered condenser. I think the timeline on that just might have been moved up.
Loved my place on 5th Ave in Idialantic and my Sunday runs to Sebastian Bch In and then s over Wabaso and back up stoping at Cptn Hirams
Good times
My impression is that rocket engines are inherently unstable. All the things any design has to balance to avoid it blowing up or vibrating itself to pieces make it dicey at best.
“Not to add to tomorrow’s suspense”
Yeah, the two hopeful astronauts-to-be came to mind immediately.
“In the early days of the space program there were plenty of failures.”
So, 60 years and still blowing up, terrific.
Close as I can get:
Yes, that would be a good thing or at least move the flare farther away.
rocket scientist: someone who blows shit up until something flies ...
Nedelin catastrophe at Baikonur Cosmodrome
They’ll sort it out. They have good engineers on staff (I know, I stole one from them!!!!). Falcon 9 wasn’t always as reliable as it is today. Starship will become that, and more.
Nice effort by you, will be interesting to hear what Spacex finds. Wonder if they will have this video as “fun” view for the Dragon astronauts tomorrow? Something to entertain them while they are waiting to launch. :)
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