Strange that I’ve never heard of this before. If I’m understanding it, they did not achieve orbit, “just” up and back?
Impressive either way, I’m glad space tech is taking off again.
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The smacktalk between the two CEOs was hilarious 
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Yes, just up and back.
To put this into perspective, consider that Blue Origin is using a single stage to raise zero payload to 100km, while SpaceX is using its single stage to accelerate a 92 ton second stage plus up to 13 tons of payload to 2km/s at the same altitude. Blue Origin has accomplished a remarkable technical feat, but it pales in comparison to SpaceX’s accomplishments.
Here’s a comparison of Blue Origin’s New Shepard and SpaceX’s Falcon 9’ flight tracks.
And let’s always remember that these systems are designed, built and launched by large teams of engineers and other skilled workers, not Musk and Bezos.
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Hey guys! The SES-9 launch is currently set for Feb 24th ! 12 days and counting! It will be in the evening of you are in the US.
There’s always the possibility of delays but hopefully we see the launch then. They will be attempting a barge landing, but in order to account for last delays go SES, spacex will launch into a higher orbit that will squeeze the margins on this landing even further. This probably means that the barge will be further downrange since there will not be a boostback burn of any kind. It could also mean a quicker braking burn which would leave the stage going faster than normal during reentry.
This is mostly conjecture but it’s based on the fact that sending a 5mt payload to GTO(while landing) was already pushing the margins of the upgraded falcon, so something has to give. There’s only so much energy in those tanks.
Having said that I think there is a good chance we will see the first successful barge landing*.
Happy flying!
*where the stage didn’t tip over afterwards. Looking at you Jason 3!
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Weather is still holding at 60% I believe the issue is forecasted high level winds of 100 kts +
On the plus side, 7 hours and 2 minutes(at the time of typing) until launch woooooooo!
Full webcast is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ml1RO4IcOG0
Techinical webcast is here: https://youtube.com/watch?v=6HSb_yBnJXA
If you don’t know anything about rockets and to be explained the basics of who they’re launching, what’s going on, how they’re landing, etc the full webcast will explain all of that.
If you are a rocket junkie like myself and want to here everyone say “go” and check off the boring stuff like GNC, MC, RSC, etc and “passing max Q” and all of that, the tech webcast is for you!
The time for launch is 3:43 PST, 6:43 EST, 23:46 UTC ( and 14 seconds if ya’ll really wanna be specific) and has a 97 minute window. So IF the rocket goes on hold, it can still potentially launch today. If today is scrubbed, there is a second window tomorrow that I’m unsure of the time. After that, I’ve got no clue I haven’t seen anything.
Disclaimer: I may have made up acronyms don’t hold me to it. I like hearing them because I still don’t know them all.
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So many tries and still not managed to sink a barge with that rocket.
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They do make a terrible anti-ship missile. The exocet puts falcon to shame 
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They’re just not using it right
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I fully support the use of rockets for deep ocean exploration 
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Finally home. The launch was scrubbed due to weather. Same time tomorrow! This time with 80% chance due to weather so it’s looking good!
Just over 6 and a half hours until launch!
Round 2 fight!(with weather)
There were actually rumblings that because there was a chance of not launching right away, they opted to scrub so there was a better chance of launching right at the beginning of the window. This due to the fact they are using super chilled lox and the longer the propellent sits in the rocket, the more of it boils off and they need all propellent they can get for this mission for the landing attempt.
Screw you Florida weather, stop making me wake up at 7AM and then scrub.
Actually, they had propellent loading issues. The LOX was being loaded too slow into falcon that it wouldn’t be full by t-0 liftoff…
Obviously the launch is scrubbed and I believe try #3 will be tomorrow, same time!
Yeah I didn’t explicitly know it was the weather, in fact I didn’t recall during the stream (I was watching the technical webcast) any mention of the reason, unless I missed some acronym or something.
Still, shakes fist at clouds.
They began an explaining a bit after the hold…it started a bit later on the technical stream…I had both open with audio on.
I don’t think it will be actually. /r/spacex lists it as “TBA” and the spacex twitter said:
Teams are reviewing the data and next available launch date.
I guess they probably just didn’t have the range booked 3 days in a row 
I saw somewhere on /r/spacex that friday had a 95% chance for weather but I guess I didn’t see an official date. You are correct.
Oh damn I just saw this:
https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight/status/703000514749984768
Multi Engine Landing Burn! Pretty handy contingency to have in the event of a center engine failure… also that will be incredibly cool/scary to watch
AAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand we have our next window!
Tomorrow, Sunday, at the same exact time it has been for the last 2 windows for where ever you are. 3:46 PST, 6:46 EST, etc. GTO launches make that nice and simple…
Just under 2 hours to launch! Streams can be found by searching SpaceX in youtube!
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