SpaceX announces new Falcon 1 launch date

mj_1903 writes "In an extremely frank and open post, SpaceX has announced that the maiden flight of their totally private spacecraft will be held no earlier than the 20th of December. They also outline the mistakes that kept them on the ground including leaving a small valve open that allowed precious liquid oxygen to boil off and the difficulties in getting oxidiser to a remote site. More coverage at Spaceflight Now."

Comments

One thing to be said for private flights...

[PurifyYourMind]

...is that they probably don't have the enormous amounts of red tape that NASA projects have to wade through. It's incredible how delayed and expensive NASA's projects get because they spend so much time trying to achieve perfect safety these days. Looking our for your astronauts is laudable, but they're just going too far lately. This last manned shuttle flight... what was it, like two years extra they spent trying to avoid another foam problem... and they had one anyway? Of course, NASA is dealing with millions of funding people (you and I, taxpayers) keeping tabs on them via the news outlets, so maybe the private endevours would fall under the same kind of scrutiny if they ever became super popular.

Re:One thing to be said for private flights...

[subterfuge]

fairly immune to public scrutiny

while I have been waiting most of my life to see private space ventures get off the ground [no pun intended] I fear that we will see rapid and oppressive over-regulation within seconds of the first pieces of a failed launch showering down on 'The Children' [TM].

Re:One thing to be said for private flights...

[hubie]

There is a HUGE difference between launching people and not. I guarantee you that if this first flight was a manned mission, they would spend just as much effort on the safety issues. For what it is worth, the unmanned rockets (Deltas, etc.) get launched much more frequently and much quicker than shuttles for that very reason, so you should be comparing the cost benefits of the Falcon to the comparable non-manned rockets presently in use.

Re:One thing to be said for private flights...

[Glock27]

I fear that we will see rapid and oppressive over-regulation within seconds of the first pieces of a failed launch showering down on 'The Children' [TM].

Since the first flight is from the Marshall Islands, such children will a) have to be floating around on the South Pacific and b) have to ignore the range warnings.

Some flights will be from Vandenberg, and will also fly over the Pacific.

Note that SpaceX already operates under the rules for unmanned launch safety, and there have been numerous launch failures that have shaped the existing rules. Again, I don't expect SpaceX to have much trouble as long as it hits its own reliability estimates, and strictly continues to launch non-human payloads.

Manned flights are another issue. Also, the proposed spaceport in New Mexico may have some "think of the children" issues, sadly enough.