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SpaceX Eyeing June 4 Window For Falcon 9 Launch
PeterBrett writes "SpaceX has finally announced the window for its first much-awaited Falcon 9 launch from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral. Subject to good weather, the company plans to launch either on Friday, June 4, or Saturday, June 5, with the window opening at 12:00 UTC on each day. As usual, SpaceX will be broadcasting the launch live from its website."
I believe that is a US vs British situation.
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
According to SpaceX, the launch windows will open at 11:00 EDT (10 CDT for those of us in NOLA), which is 1500 UTC.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Yes, the Brits see a corporation as a collection of individuals, and Americans see it as a wholly new entity. Insert snarky joke about recent US Supreme Court decisions here....
I'd been under the impression that other issues at the Cape had pushed it further back and I'd miss it. If they can hit either of these dates I'll be able to watch it.
The last Atlas launch I got to watch was very impressive. Not quite like a shuttle launch but still cool.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
When I was a kid I always thought the first man to land on Mars would have a NASA logo on his uniform. Now I know that he won't. And whether that man is a commercial astronaut or one from some other country (or union), it's sad to think how far we've come (down) since those days when we used to believe that moon bases and giant space stations were just around the corner.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
We will be fine (we will be fine)
Falcon 9! (Falcon 9!)
Even though NASA say
"Way out of line!" (outta line!)
.
Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
This may prove to be one of the most important stories of the 21st century...the opening of space (beyond LEO) to commerce and industry and (hopefully) colonization.
Great warrior...hrmph! Wars not make one great.
When Charles Lindbergh crossed the atlantic he wasnt doing it in a government plane he did it on a Ryan-NYP. NASA didnt exist back then.
The fact that it was an American pilot flying an american plane was all that mattered.
As for the rest we simply have to figure out how to do it for billions instead of trillions.
What is past is prologue and the future is not yet written.
Do you not mean 'Google are failing me'?
I believe that is a US vs British situation.
Confirming that I'm British, if that helps.
Pirate Party UK
Elon sold Paypal years ago. SpaceX is all american workers. Way to keep up!
http://wwww.zerospeaks.com
Parent is a complete idiot. Elon no longer has any involvement in PayPal. SpaceX's technology is completely covered by ITAR; I should know, because I considered applying for a job there and was told that, as a non-US citizen, I shouldn't even bother. The Falcon 9 is very much an American rocket built by Americans. There are indeed "no foreign nationals, no outsourced jobs."
It's unusual to hear someone praising ITAR. ITAR is the reason that non-US organisations generally don't use US launchers for their payloads -- they can't work closely with the launch provider, particularly with respect to the sort of detailed technical information that's often very important in ensuring payload-launcher compatibility. People I've spoken to in the space industry while at conferences in the US frequently bemoan the fact that ITAR heavily restricts their hiring practices, meaning that they often miss out on being able to employ top people.
ITAR is what's holding the US space programme back.
Pirate Party UK
Only 991 launches untill they release the Millenium Falcon.
If you compare the Falcon 9 to other rockets you can't fail to see that this thing is quire cleverly designed in a very straight way.
It has only two stages and uses Kerosine/LOX in both stages. Kerosine is much denser than LH and makes for smaller tanks and easier handling. Both stages are essentially identical, with the second stage much shorter but using the same diametre tanks and domes and the same tools for fabrication. Both stages use the very same engines, too. 9 on the first stage, one in the second stage. This allows them to be build assembly-line style, much cheaper than to build several differently sized engines in small numbers.
The Falcon 9 Heavy will add to this two boosters consisting of just two first stages strapped to the center one. This thing will still use the same tools and the same tanks and domes and engines (28 of them) for all stages and for the boosters. Compare this to other similar launchers which often use two (or even three) different engines and tanks for their stages plus solid boosters, all expensively build in small numbers.
Certainly not true. ITAR is export controlled only. Typically DoD stuff. The model being looked into will be that of procurement only. The government will no longer have any ownership of the systems. Just like government cars and trucks that are bought for every day use are assembled in Mexico/Canada from parts from China or wherever GM/Ford builds them. Oh the contract winning company may be US based, but that's where it stops. There is no protection for the workers underneath.
Oh, sure, this is entirely correct. Maybe I should apologise for calling you an idiot, despite your hideously misinformed opinions on the constitution of the SpaceX workforce and supply chain. :-P
But think about it this way. If you, the US taxpayer, have just spent a billion dollars on a set of instruments for use in orbit and have four of your best and brightest young people sitting on top of it, surely you'll want to make sure that you have the best performing and most reliable launcher money can buy?
If that can be sold to you by a company based in the US and doing all of its manufacturing and assembly in the US, so much the better. After all, this is exactly the type of very high tech project that your country still prides itself on. But given that the cost of the launch is a relatively small proportion of the cost of a space mission, but contributes a very large proportion of the risk, wouldn't it be reasonable to buy flights from the best provider available, whether based in the US or not, in order to minimize the risk to the taxpayer's investment in the equipment and personnel to be launched?
This all depends on how you perceive the US space programme. If you consider the missions to be a good in themselves (e.g. provision of high quality meteorological data, monitoring of high-altitude ash clouds from volcanos, measuring ground displacement and urban damage in the wake of an earthquake), weighing up only the results of each programme against its final budget, then you come to one conclusion. On the other hand, if you -- like several US Senators, apparently -- consider it most important that NASA is the mechanism for a large taxpayer subsidy towards jobs in the high-tech industries, then you'll come to another.
In this case, Commercial Space means Outsourced.
And, I ask, is this an inherently bad thing?
Pirate Party UK
You are in fact an idiot of epic proportions. You couldn't be any more wrong, from their website:
"linux is just DOS with a UNIX like syntax" -- Galactic Dominator (944134)
ITAR is export controlled only.
...which includes "deemed export", e.g. exporting information by permitting a foreign national access to it.
Typically DoD stuff.
Most of the categories in the list of "munitions" covered by ITAR are pretty clearly military. Category XV, however, covers "Spacecraft Systems and Associated Equipment", including non-military equipment.
Just like government cars and trucks that are bought for every day use are assembled in Mexico/Canada from parts from China or wherever GM/Ford builds them.
See "deemed export". Sending drawings and technical data to an overseas supplier would get you in trouble.
Certainly not true. ITAR is export controlled only.
Which, if you take the time to read the ITAR documentation, you would know also includes any and all spacecraft systems. I used to help on a small, local satellite project at the university where I went to school. We designed and built 10 cm x 10 cm x 10 cm cubesats that were primarily constructed from commercial off the shelf components. Even our cubesat systems were subject to ITAR control and all of our projects, developed entirely for civilian, educational purposes, were inspected by national security officials regularly to ensure we met ITAR compliance. I guarantee you that Falcon 9, and all of SpaceX's systems are also ITAR restricted and, probably, even more heavily scrutinized. Furthermore, SpaceX does all of its development in-house which is precisely why they have managed to keep their production costs so low. They don't rely on subcontractors (and thus, outsourcing). So your original point is moot. ITAR applies to every space system developed within American borders. Circumventing such heavy restrictions costs millions of dollars in legal wrangling and an indescribably painful court battle (that will probably earn you a lot of enemies in the government).
In short, you, sir, are a terribly misinformed fool.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
The summary is never wrong, please, you have hurt me in my core beliefs :p
Never antropomorphize computers, they do not like that
In retrospect, NASA officials have decided that the time-honoured countdown-to-launch procedure is overly complicated - so this time around the flight controller will simply say "FALCON... LAUNCH!" and it will take off.
Bow-ties are cool.
Oh cheer up.. the next Von Braun is simply another World War away..
It's unusual to hear someone praising ITAR. ITAR is the reason that non-US organisations generally don't use US launchers for their payloads -- they can't work closely with the launch provider, particularly with respect to the sort of detailed technical information that's often very important in ensuring payload-launcher compatibility. People I've spoken to in the space industry while at conferences in the US frequently bemoan the fact that ITAR heavily restricts their hiring practices, meaning that they often miss out on being able to employ top people. ITAR is what's holding the US space programme back.
Completely agreed. It's particularly silly when one notes that the US would have almost certainly lost the 1960s space race if it weren't for Von Braun and his team of rocket engineers from Germay, and the Canadian and British engineers from Avro.
It also makes it considerably more difficult when a launch provider like SpaceX wants to sell launch services, which is a large part of why Russian and European launch providers are currently creaming US launch providers on the international market. For example, the following difficulty occurred when SpaceX's Falcon 1 was launching a Malaysian satellite:
http://www.hobbyspace.com/nucleus/?itemid=13078
Technicians discovered the satellite and the Falcon 1 upper stage rocket share a nearly identical vibrational mode, which could set up a damaging resonance. SpaceX is bound by ITAR restrictions from assisting with any technical problems on the foreign-owned payload, so the company delayed the launch to add some vibration isolation equipment between the rocket's upper stage and the payload adapter.
"The easiest thing would actually be to make some adjustment to the satellite . . . but that's not allowed," Musk says.
I would give better than 50% that the first person on Mars will be wearing a space/mars suit that has sponsor logo's like a race driver.
Ward
. Silence! Be thankful thy species is unpalatable! .
It also makes it considerably more difficult when a launch provider like SpaceX wants to sell launch services, which is a large part of why Russian and European launch providers are currently creaming US launch providers on the international market. For example, the following difficulty occurred when SpaceX's Falcon 1 was launching a Malaysian satellite:
http://www.hobbyspace.com/nucleus/?itemid=13078
Technicians discovered the satellite and the Falcon 1 upper stage rocket share a nearly identical vibrational mode, which could set up a damaging resonance. SpaceX is bound by ITAR restrictions from assisting with any technical problems on the foreign-owned payload, so the company delayed the launch to add some vibration isolation equipment between the rocket's upper stage and the payload adapter.
"The easiest thing would actually be to make some adjustment to the satellite . . . but that's not allowed," Musk says.
Just one of many examples, sadly. Unless Congress acts promptly to introduce some sanity into the ITAR provisions, I fear that ITAR is inevitably going to drive innovative and competitive launch providers like SpaceX out of business, and prove to be the final nail in the coffin of the US space industry.
Pirate Party UK
As others have pointed out, this is not how things work in the real world. As far as the US government is concerned, all rocket development is "munition" development. Not only must you get permission to export any rocket or rocket technology developed in the US, as a US national you can't go to another country to work on a rocket project without running afoul of the law. Having foreign nationals working on your rocket falls under the "exporting rocket technology" part.
This came up a few years back when Armadillo was suffering because they government refused to get its act together. The suggestion made was "well, why don't you start a company in another country and build your rocket there." The answer was eventually determined to be "because everyone would end up in jail".
I believe that is a US vs British situation.
Slashdot vs British?