SpaceX launch - 11:51 a.m. PDT - Formosat-5

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>>138881458
bumpan

Kekspeed Formosat-5.

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reddit the suit.

very light sat. was going to be a falcon 1 mission. They could do RTLS, but they don't have permission to do so on the west coast yet

>>138882267
Why so much delay?

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>>138882214
Looks more like if The Stig got tired of cars and went into aerospace

>>138882361
We're still 5 minutes out from launch.

Less than 2 minutes till launch

Launch, launch, c'mon launch!

>>138882361
amos-6, the Spaceflight 2nd payload dropped out, etc. Lots of little things added up. SpX is likely loosing money on this launch, but you gotta follow the contracts...

>>138881458
made it just in time for 30 seconds.

Liftoff!

>>138881458
sweet got in right in time to see the launch!

good MECO, mvac ignited

That Merlin engine is a thing a beauty.

N O M I N A L
O
M
I
N
A
L

>>138883249
take a drink

>>138883249
NOMINALITY

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AWESOME bros! I fucking love science!! Explore the stars oh man it's so fucking real and epic.

S1 coming back down

S2 just cracked 10k km/h

watching stage 1 drop is intense.

30 seconds to entry burn!

heeeerrrreee comes s1

waffles are ready

s2 good orbit

only seconds to s1 landing

nailed it

Looks like s1 landed successfully.

that was cool to watch.

>>138881458
Shame the feed cut out just on stage one landing but otherwise that was pretty cool.

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Uhh, did s2 lose a piece of foil or something?

475 kg payload. Super tiny. Rumor is they are gonna do funky stuff with the remaining fuel in s2, to test out s2 recovery routines.

>>138884393
s2 usually sheds various bits of insulation, ice, and foil

>>138884480
Oh, well if that's normal then nevermind.

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F9 now has a 95% success rate. 12th launch this year - on par with the Russians. Next launch is 7 sept; the X-37B!

>>138885198
Hnnnnnng

>>138882214
It does look pretty cool and especially in black.
>its better than the space suit you built i bet

Where the FUCK is falcon heavy?

>>138886154
soon. All three sticks are being integrated right now. We are actually under 6 mo from FH launch, for once. Q4 this year

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>>138882390

I love watching these. Every launch these get successfully used and reused just means we have overcome a gigantic cost hurdle in space travel. The best analogy i can think of is its like going from sail boats to coal engine boats in five years, and from people who just started making them. Basically we ARE gonna make it to mars because of this.

>>138886964
Orbital shipyard when?

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Soon.

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>>138882390
Hes not The Stig but actually his late brother who was an original settler on Mars.

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>>138881458
How many towns serve no economic purpose? I'm trying to understand this whole space economy thing, but it's like making the argument that we should live in the middle of the ocean.

What do people who live and work in space do that is so economically productive it pays for the 2.6 billion a year rent for their living quarters in space? (current NASA cost)

Or will SpaceX somehow reduce the cost of keeping people in space by 100,000 fold?

>>138889818
Bumping for interest, I'd like to know what concrete plan has everyone so hyped up.

It's weird though that google turns up nothing. What search terms did you guys use?

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>>138886964
I got to VR "Buzz Aldrin: Cycling Pathways to Mars" and one way we might do this is by using the rubberbandy nature of gravity.

>>138882214
Are they still not using form fitting helmets, like motorcycles despite the Colombia recommendations?

shill thread
how is this not deleted?
how is this politically incorrect?

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>>138889818
>What do people who live and work in space do that is so economically productive it pays for the 2.6 billion a year rent for their living quarters in space? (current NASA cost)
On ISS now, scientific research that can only be performed in microgravity. Think of the ISS as a specialized facility like the Large Hadron Collider and it makes more sense.
In the future? If launch costs keep dropping the way they have, the original idea was orbital power stations. Sunlight is 10x as concentrated outside the atmosphere, and transmission efficiency through the atmosphere is about as efficient as a standard long-distance power line.
If it's cheap enough to get people there, there are tons of economic, military, political, and scientific reasons to expand into space.

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>>138891241
Space exploration has always been driven by political interests. Right now the return of the '/pol/ buys an island' threads are fantastical circlejerking, but given enough time pic related is feasible with enough industry in orbit. Don't like the neighbors? Build a new neighborhood and scoot a few light-hours away.

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>>138889818
The best thing I can think of are those sweet, sweet space minerals for energy gases or metals, if we can successfully mine asteroids or other planets and bring them back economically, we can become post-scarcity