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SpaceX's Falcon 1 Destroyed During Maiden Voyage

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the more-waiting-to-become-an-asteroid-farmer dept.

legolas writes "SpaceX's Falcon 1 is the world's first privately funded satellite launch vehicle. After a successful static engine test on Wednesday, it was launched today. Unfortunately, the rocket was destroyed shortly after launch."

16 of 293 comments (clear)

  1. Early days by SteelFist · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Sounds a bit like the early days of our space program.

  2. "partially reusable rocket" by ds_job · · Score: 5, Funny

    That will be reusable as in "We are all reused parts of supernovae" or "We all have a billion atoms of Julius Caesar's body incorporated into our own" and not "Just pick it up , dust it off and we're ready to go again!"

    1. Re:"partially reusable rocket" by roystgnr · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Actually it is the "partially" in the sense that the first stage should parachute and be reused, but the second stage is space junk.

      This is the right way to do it, too. Lower stages are larger, so you can save more money making them reusable. They're less important for overall rocket performance, so when making them reusable reduces their performance it's not so bad. They don't reach orbital speeds, so you can recover them without reentry shields or even without flyback capability. If we're going to move toward reusable rockets (which could be a very good idea) at a gradual pace (which the Shuttle program has proved is a good idea), the way to start is from the bottom up.

  3. Woohoo! by MyLongNickName · · Score: 5, Funny

    I've got two tickets for the maiden flight of Falcon 2! I guess this means I should get my ride soon, huh?

    --
    See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
  4. This isn't... by Tackhead · · Score: 5, Insightful
    C'mon, Elon! This isn't rocket sci... oh, right. Well then, there we are.

    And to add insult to injury, we'll link your web server from Slashdot.

    Seriously, Elon. Good on you. SpaceX is doing something risky and interesting. Make as many mistakes as it takes to get the job done. Unlike NASA, the bulk of your funding comes from a free market, and you're therefore motivated to learn from your mistakes. The day you build something your investors are willing to let you slap a "man-rated" label on, I'll be in line with tickets to fly on it.

  5. Re:I had wondered... by Intron · · Score: 5, Funny

    Just as bizarre was that they had a payload on their first launch attempt. That's like trying to ship the Beta! That would never happen in software.

    --
    Intron: the portion of DNA which expresses nothing useful.
  6. Re:Impact or RSO destroyed? by nacnud75 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I think the RSO terminated the thrust due to excessive rolling (there is no 'self destruct' on the faclon 1, then engin just awitches off)

  7. Re:First flight with a paying customer?! by hitchhikerjim · · Score: 5, Insightful

    $6 Million rocket. $800,000 payload. The cost of the payload is pretty small, all things considered. It's worth the risk to go ahead and fly the payload the first time. Saves you $5 million if it works, and cost you less than $1 million if it fails. ...and when you add in that everything's going to be insured, it makes finantial sense.

  8. Re:I had wondered... by roystgnr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Just as bizarre was that they had a payload on their first launch attempt.

    The payload cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, true, but lifting it into orbit costs millions. As long as they had a better than 10% chance of success, it was a good risk to take.

  9. Re:I had wondered... by david.given · · Score: 5, Informative
    Just as bizarre was that they had a payload on their first launch attempt.

    The payload massed 20kg (the Falcon could have lifted about 700kg) and was built by Air Force Academy cadets. I suspect it was being launched, er, would have been launched for free. After all, you have to test rockets with something, and you may as well launch something useful rather than a dumb telemetry package.

  10. Re:I had wondered... by interiot · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Well, the payload was a microsatellite, so the actual hardware didn't cost a huge amount really (~$100,000?). Anybody have any idea how much the USAF Academy paid for the launch?

    Also, a large part of satellite cost is in the R&D, so if there are further funds, then building a duplicate would cost a fair bit less than the first one, right?

  11. Space Aint Cheap by Ash+Vince · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Its interesting to compare this with the scram jet trials currently scheduled by Qinetic (British Defence Contractor thats just been privatised)

    Qinetic are about to test fire a £1 million scramjet directly into the ground. If it works it will fire for 6 seconds before it hits earth at mach 7.

    The problem with seeking venture capital is the the investors usually want a return of their investment within a specified (Probably too short) time frame.

    Successful space exploration takes man decades not man hours.

    --
    I dont read /. to RTFA, I read /. to offend people in ignorance.
  12. Re:I had wondered... by iamlucky13 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Since the payload was a student project, it has no doubt already accomplished it's primary mission: to give engineering and science students experience in a large-scale, real world project designing and building a satellite and it's experiments. It's sad that they won't get to see the final fruits of their labors and the product of their effort was destroyed, but this doesn't really affect their overall education. The science loss is pretty small, as I'm pretty certain other satellites have studied similar phenomena in the past.

    I think the Air Force giving SpaceX a launch contract was partially throwing them a bone to help get another launch provider off the ground (no pun intended), and partially saving money. No doubt had SpaceX not happened to be up-and-coming as they are, this would have gone up on a Pegasus or piggybacked with another satellite on a bigger rocket, like I believe the first Falcon-Sat was.

    NASA's first failed attempts at orbit also had payloads on board.

  13. Ariane 5 by JonBuck · · Score: 5, Informative
    Consider for a moment the failure of Ariane 5's maiden flight in 1996.

    Aboard Ariane 5 was Cluster -- a $500 million set of four identical scientific satellites that were designed to to establish precisely how the Earth's magnetic field interacts with solar winds.

    The unmanned rocket was on its first voyage after years of intense development by some of Europe's leading scientists. The explosion was a setback for Arianespace, whose previous models of the Ariane rocket had been some of the most reliable vehicles for satellite launches.

    The European Space Agency estimated that total development of Ariane 5 cost more than $8 billion.


    Maiden flights are perilous things. They got a full minute of flight data that they didn't have before. I'm sure the next one will be a success.
  14. A launch a day keeps the high costs away by Baldrson · · Score: 5, Informative
    One of the things that John Carmack does correctly is lots of small flights with the possibility to scale upon success. John Walker wrote a paper about this approach (restricted to expendables) called "A Rocket a Day Keeps the High Costs Away". It's good advice. It's too bad more people (to be fair, such as John Walker himself) don't take it to heart.

    --
    Seastead this.
  15. Re:Crash and Burn Testing by O2H2 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    As a designer of very successful rockts I can tell you why making a rocket fly is much harder than making darn near any other machine function properly...you are trying to harness enormous energies which do more than just push the rocket upward. The vibration and shock environments are beyond anything you probably have experienced. A simple connector can see upwards of 300 Grms without even trying. You can reduce polymeric materials to a puddle just with hysteretic heating from vibration. And you cannot simulate and predict everything. Weird system interactions are par for the course. You can only get first flight success with a lot of painful experience. SpaceX do not have this level of experience.

    That is why demonstrated reliability cannot be replaced by calculation. Spacex bragged about their high reliability but it is all on paper. Successful rockets have tens of thousands of hours of debugging of problems built into them. You just never see it. Nothing can replace hours in the air. And they come slowly and at great expense.

    Elon is now going to learn firsthand why spaceflight is so damn expensive. It is not the lack of innovation or intelligence at Lockheed Martin or Boeing- it is the brutal reality that nature imposes on lack of attention to detail and ignorance. It ain't the metal in the rocket - its the know-how in the people. We have to dig down to root cause on even the most innocuous anomaly - hence we know a lot more about flaws in parts than damn near anybody on the planet. But this knowledge is pricey.