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SpaceX Successfully Launches Jason-3 Satellite, Rocket Landing Partial Success (theverge.com)

Posted by samzenpus on from the win-some-and-lose-some dept.

An anonymous reader writes: SpaceX successfully launched a Falcon 9 rocket today carrying the Jason-3 ocean monitoring satellite. "Jason-3 data will be used for monitoring global sea level rise, researching human impacts on oceans, aiding prediction of hurricane intensity, and operational marine navigation," NASA said. Unfortunately Space X reports that the attempt to land the Falcon 9 on a drone platform was only a partial success. According to the company twitter page: "First stage on target at droneship but looks like hard landing; broke landing leg." Update: 01/18 04:16 GMT by S : Here's a brief video of the landing attempt (somewhat loud).

17 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. It's really too soon for this post. by Rei · · Score: 2

    I didn't submit this news because really we barely know anything at the moment. Jason-3 is still awaiting its second burn, and without knowing anything more than "it has a broken leg" I think it's too soon to call the landing a "partial success". The second burn will be happening shortly, and they said we'd get more data about the landing in a few hours.

    Be patient, grasshopper.

    --
    He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
    1. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by Dan+East · · Score: 4, Funny

      Wait a second. You're saying Slashdot is posting news too fast??? What alternate reality are we in?

      --
      Better known as 318230.
    2. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by Rei · · Score: 4, Informative

      Confirmation of Jason-3 separation. *Now* we can say that "SpaceX Sucessfully Launches Jason-3 Satellite".

      Now let's wait for news on the landing...

      --
      He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
    3. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by rasmusbr · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The live stream froze just as a yellow reflection (rocket exhaust most likely) became visible on the surface of the ship, which probably means that the rocket was no more than 50 meters or so from the ship at that time. So it seems plausible that it hit the ship. I imagine SpaceX has recovered footage from the ship by now unless the antenna got hit by debris from the explosion.

      The fuel and the tank is quite fragile and at least one of the engines is extremely hot and located near the fuel tank, so unless the landing is perfect the tank will burst and the fuel will ignite. I expect we'll see some fiery footage within a day or two once they've had time to analyse it internally.

    4. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by mobby_6kl · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is why I think that barge landing is pointless, unless it is on a nice still lake, or the barge is 100 percent stabilized. If teh barge is lifting, it can land too hard. If sinking it might be a little better. Just seems like an un-needed complication

      Well they aren't doing it just for shits and giggles - landing on the barge requires significantly less fuel than returning all the way to the launch site. This, turn, reduces the payload capacity and increases the cost per kg.

      I do wonder how feasible it would be to build some sort of a hydraulically stabilized landing platform on top of the barge - not only could it compensate for the shitty weather, but also soften the landing if it detected the rocket coming in too fast.

    5. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by taiwanjohn · · Score: 2

      Unfortunately, they didn't make the landing. According to Elon via Twitter:

      Definitely harder to land on a ship. Similar to an aircraft carrier vs land: much smaller target area, that's also translating & rotating.

      Also:

      However, that was not what prevented it being good. Touchdown speed was ok, but a leg lockout didn't latch, so it tipped over after landing.

      It will be interesting to see how well they can zero-in on the 'carrier' landing in future flights. When you combine the trans-sonic approach with the chaos of ocean waves, the magnitude of this task is mind boggling. I can't wait. ;-)

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, you're not using enough of it. --AC
    6. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by TheGavster · · Score: 4, Informative

      I also thought that going back to barge landings seemed like an unnecessary complication, as I was under the impression that the reason the first two attempts were at sea was because that proof-of-concept was needed to get permits for a ground landing. Today during the webcast, though, they clarified that for polar orbits such as this, they need to launch from Vandenburg in California, and there isn't a convenient piece of ground to land on.

      --
      "Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
    7. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by DanielRavenNest · · Score: 4, Informative

      > I do wonder how feasible it would be to build some sort of a hydraulically stabilized landing platform on top of the barge

      Look up "Sea Launch", which was a partnership between Boeing, Kvaerner A.G. (Norwegian ship and drilling platform builder), and Russian rocket companies. They launched rockets from a converted drilling platform out in the Pacific Ocean.

      A semi-submersible platform like that takes on ballast water to lower the center of mass below the waves, while the platform on top is held *above* the water on columns. The waves can then pass through the columns without moving the platform much, because it's not a solid wall like the side of a ship. The ballast water mass also makes the whole platform more massive and hard to move.

      Right now (or very soon) you will likely be able to pick up drilling platforms for scrap value. With the price of oil so low, expensive ways to extract oil, like fracking and ocean drilling, can't make a profit, so the drilling companies stop doing it, and some of them go bankrupt.

    8. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by catchblue22 · · Score: 4, Informative

      The latest tweets from Musk indicate that on reading the data, the landing was not "hard". Apparently one of the legs failed to lock. Also it landed 1.3m from the center.

      Elon Musk @elonmusk 6h6 hours ago

      Definitely harder to land on a ship. Similar to an aircraft carrier vs land: much smaller target area, that's also translating & rotating.

      Elon Musk @elonmusk 6h6 hours ago

      However, that was not what prevented it being good. Touchdown speed was ok, but a leg lockout didn't latch, so it tipped over after landing.

      Most of the posts in this discussion are based on incomplete information.

      --
      This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when first he appears as a protector - Plato (423 to 327 BC)
    9. Re:It's really too soon for this post. by Rei · · Score: 2

      Generally, having land downrange is considered a bug, not a feature. It makes permitting very hard because nobody likes the concept of half a million kilograms of explosive fuel and oxidizer along with tons of shrapnel-aluminum skin and big heavy engines landing in their town in the event of failure where the self-destruct mechanism doesn't do its job.

      That said, yes, Florida is probably enough downrange so as not to be a major source of concern. Still, I'd think it would be too far for Falcon 9 boosters, at least on most missions. Maybe it would be suitable for Falcon Heavy's core stage, though.

      --
      He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
  2. Re:Why is the ship a "drone"? by Rei · · Score: 4, Informative

    Because it has no crew and is remote controlled, with various automated features such as locking to specified GPS coordinates..

    I'm not sure why you're confused about this.

    --
    He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
  3. Actual update! by Rei · · Score: 4, Informative

    Oooh, actual news:

    However, that was not what prevented it being good. Touchdown speed was ok, but a leg lockout didn't latch, so it tipped over after landing.

    Great to have the update. Not so great for whatever people were in charge with making, prepping, and inspecting the legs ;) Unless it was a design flaw.

    I guess we have a new question now - why it didn't lock.

    --
    He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
    1. Re:Actual update! by ColdWetDog · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The booster is strong in only one direction - the longitudinal one. If you try to catch it with cables, it goes on it's sides which are just thin walled aluminum, Like a giant beer can. It's a matter of weight. Tradeoffs.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  4. Re:sea-legs by Rei · · Score: 2

    It did hit the bullseye, but it didn't have to.

    Regardless, we now know that this incident was due to "Touchdown speed was ok, but a leg lockout didn't latch, so it tipped over after landing." The question is why the leg didn't latch.

    --
    He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
  5. Re:Latest update: by Rei · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well, at least the pieces were bigger this time! Won't be last RUD, but am optimistic about upcoming ship landing.

    Musk provides the first pic. Actually, I expected worse. They can probably scrap this one for parts and send them off to destructive testing.

    --
    He's the sort of person who would sell the Red Cross to Dracula.
  6. Re:4 legs look not very stable. Why not 6 - 8 legs by mobby_6kl · · Score: 3, Funny

    You need better legs and not more legs, that's what I kept telling my ex-girlfriend, too. That didn't work out too well, though maybe Elon will have more luck.

  7. Here's the video of the landing.Damn it was close by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Here's the video of the landing :https://www.instagram.com/p/BAqirNbwEc0/

    The rocket made a near perfect landing, even better than the last one. It must be so frustrating for SpaceX team to fail because of something like this.