SpaceX Dragon Set To Launch

SpaceX's first regular launch to the International Space Station is set to go off at 8:35 (Eastern time) Sunday evening; the first SpaceX launch to successfully reach the ISS was more of a test, though it did bring some goodies to the crew. Wired has a live video feed in place. Slashdot reader Lee Sheridan is in Florida for the launch; if you're one of the billion Facebook users, his photos of the mission briefing and Falcon 9 lift vehicle being lifted to vertical are public. The SpaceX twitter feed might be fun to watch, too. Update: 10/08 00:09 GMT by T : Bonus points for intelligent parsing of the acronym-laden communications on the live feed.

Comments

/. timing always sucks

[evilviper]

Slashdot... It's the website I watch like a hawk, so that I can find out about live events, 5 minutes before they happen (if I'm really, really lucky).

Re:/. timing always sucks

[Teancum]

Details about the Dragon "version 1.1" can be found here:

http://www.aviationweek.com/Blogs.aspx?plckBlogId=Blog:04ce340e-4b63-4d23-9695-d49ab661f385&plckPostId=Blog%3A04ce340e-4b63-4d23-9695-d49ab661f385Post%3A8039e573-151a-434a-808d-bb5a8a3ad59b

Re:/. timing always sucks

[Teancum]

And if the boot sequence itself still doesn't impress you, at least you can say you were alive to see the dawn of commercial computers.

While it was before my time, the dawn of commercial computers was a big deal. There also was a time that only government agencies like the U.S. Army (who helped pay for the ENIAC and in part the COLOSSUS as well) even owned computers. A rather infamous declaration by an early computer pioneer declared that the worldwide demand for computers was exactly five.

Even so, I remember a field trip in kindergarten where I took a trip to a computer and walked inside ('look but don't touch"). It seems funny to talk about such things today or that a field trip to see a computer would even be remarkable, but I do find this stuff to be incredibly fascinating.

I can only hope that multi-ton launches to orbital space stations will some day be as remarkable as seeing a jet aircraft take off from an airport. Perhaps inspiring sights, but common and every day experiences too.

Simplicity

[Dan East]

One thing that strikes me is how modern technology has simplified so many things. Mission control is so much simpler and streamlined - just flat screen monitors on tables. Much cleaner. Even the launch system, using a static support tower angled away from the rocket, appears (at least to my untrained eye) much simpler these days than the mechanized support systems that had to release or pull away from the rockets.

Launch looks perfect so far. Second stage just ignited.

Re:Simplicity

[thrich81]

Don't know if this contradicts your statement much, but the first US space launches (uncrewed and crewed) were pretty simple affairs. Both (Explorer 1 and Mercury -Redstone 3) used the Redstone IRBM as the basis of the launch vehicle. Since the Redstone was a field deployable ballistic missile its launch support was minimal, not much more than a launch ring to sit on according to a bio of Von Braun I just read. The first Saturns (Saturn I) didn't have much either. Check out the picture of the first one launched (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_I). The two stage Saturn I's had nearly the same payload capability as the Falcon 9. The later Saturns and the Shuttle had a lot of ground support, I'll admit.

SpaceX stream

[Altanar]

If you missed it, you can watch the recording at http://www.spacex.com/webcast/, which in my opinion, was the best way of viewing it live.

pop

[strack]

i watched the launch, and on the closeup view of the engines from spacex, one of those engines definitely went pop at 1:20 into the flight. you can see the debris coming off. its unmistakable. i guess its a testament to the value of having the ability to sustain a engine failure and still get into orbit.

Re:In Orbit

[Altanar]

Except... *ahem*.. The catestrophic failure of engine one at T+1:20. Shielding and control systems easily compensated, though.

Re:Space Shuttle was better

[vlm]

The Space Shuttle carried 28,000lbs to the International Space Station for about $400 million per launch.

LOL you wish it was that cheap. You took total contract cost divided by number of missions for spaceX, why not for space shuttle? Because the numbers don't match your axe to grind. Here I'll do the data gathering and division for you:

From wikipedia "The actual total cost of the shuttle program through 2011, adjusted for inflation, is $196 billion." (this is pure BS, to "do it all over again" would easily cost over 300B, but I'll use the artificially low PR/marketing BS number for the sake of this argument) divided by 135 missions (unsure how to account for disasters) yields 1.452 billion dollars per 28K lb mission absolute minimum, real world is going to be much more.

So you're looking at 1.6B vs 1.5B, not much of a difference given "nasa accounting" thats a rounding error.

There are serious issues why the shuttle program had to end which began in the 80s, so its pointless to debate what if we continued it. For example we lost about 1 shuttle per 50 flights, and the production lines shut down permanently in the 80s. So if we launch until they're all destroyed, we soon would have no launch capability at all, and merely have to farm out to spaceX later, and the only thing waiting does is make stuff more expensive. I suppose we could R+D and reopen the production lines to build more 1970 era space shuttle orbiters, but that will absolutely explode program cost above the "cheap" 1.5B per launch. Or we could R+D even more and build new 2010 era space shuttle orbiters, that would probably be overall a bit cheaper but still boost program cost above 1.5B.

If you wanted to continue the shuttle program, that decision had to be made in the 80s when the last orbiter rolled off the assembly line and the clock started ticking on the program shutdown. Sunday Oct 07 2012 is a bit late to the party to decide the orbiter production line should have been kept open back in April of 1985. First, build a time machine and go back more than a quarter century...