SpaceX's Helipad-Equipped Boat Will Bring Astronauts Safely Home

Next year when SpaceX starts shuttling astronauts to and from the ISS, the company will be using its Go Searcher ocean vessel to recover SpaceX's crewed Dragon capsules that splash down in the Atlantic Ocean. "The ship is now equipped for a worst-case-scenario with medical treatment facilities and a helipad, in case returning astronauts need to be evacuated quickly to a hospital," reports The Verge. From the report: Go Searcher is part of a fleet of ocean vessels that SpaceX has acquired over the years to aid in its spaceflight efforts. The most famous of these are SpaceX's autonomous drone ships, which are used as landing pads when the company's Falcon 9 rockets are recovered in the ocean after launches. Go Searcher used to accompany these drone ships when they were tugged back to shore as a support vessel. But at the end of summer, SpaceX gave Go Searcher a suite of upgrades -- including the addition of a helipad and a radar dome -- to make sure the boat can swiftly recover Dragon capsules that carry astronauts back to Earth.

As part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, SpaceX has been developing the Crew Dragon capsule to take astronauts to the ISS. And the company is also responsible for getting these crews safely back to Earth. When astronauts need to return home, the plan is for the Crew Dragon to splash down in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Florida. During an ideal mission, Go Searcher will lift the Crew Dragon out of the water with a crane, attached to the end of the boat, according to NASA. The capsule will then be hauled onto the deck of Go Searcher, and the astronauts will be evaluated by doctors from SpaceX and NASA. But if something goes awry during the landing, astronauts can be airlifted directly off the boat via helicopter and taken to a hospital. The helicopter will also carry medical emergency personnel.

Comments

A thought experiment, a) mass isn't real

[Anonymous Coward]

If any physicists are around, I have some thought experiments for you. I'm going to post them on slashdot science articles likely to viewed by physicists.
They are a series of postulates and their justifications.

Please humour me. Read them, argue against them, call me a moron if you like, but *read* them.
Lets start with postulate A, mass isn't real.

Postulate A: Mass isn't real
Postulate B:
Postulate C:
Postulate D:
Postulate E:
Postulate E2:
POSTULATE F: The speed of light is obvious
POSTULATE G:
POSTULATE H:
Postulate I:
Postulate J:
Postulate J2:
Postulate K:
Postulate L:

----------
Postulate A: Mass isn't real

You have matter, which is {'stuff' with wave like properties plus energy}
And you have light, electro magnetic waves which are { 'stuff' with wave like properties plus energy}

And the two are interchangable, you can convert matter to light, light to matter.

And energy comes in two forms.
1) Kinetic, a velocity based energy (heat etc all related to this).
2) Electro Magnetic, some form of energy plus some form of wave like property conflated together.

And the two are not interchangeable. Unlike other energies, e.g. potential, heat, that are interchangeable.
Kinetic energy doesn't turn into electromagnetic, it misses this extra 'wave' like property.

You *can* convert matter to light (with the extra wave property) but not to kinetic (which is pure energy based on velocity).

Since light and matter are both wave like, and since light and matter are interchangable.... ...whatever gives matter its wave like property, also gives light its wave light property.

And this underlying 'wave' stuff must have zero mass, because when its in light it has no mass.

i.e. mass cannot form part of the fundamental model.

In light form, this wave stuff, is moving fast.
In matter form, it is stationary.
So the energy must be similar to kinetic when in light form.
And similar to bonds, binding it in place, when in matter form.

So all that's happened is that the stuff that makes up matter and light, has gone from being bound *tightly*
to being bound *loosely*. The energy has gone from *binding* energy to *velocity* energy.

So mass isn't a thing. It doesn't disappear and get replaced by energy, its simply a measure of how strong the binding
force is. Kinetic energy isn't related to mass, its related to the changes in binding force.

i.e. Mass isn't real, it's simply a measure of binding force potential. Postulate A .