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The Space Topic

In the words of John Glenn,

“I guess the question I'm asked the most often is: "When you were sitting in that capsule listening to the count-down, how did you feel?" Well, the answer to that one is easy. I felt exactly how you would feel if you were getting ready to launch and knew you were sitting on top of two million parts -- all built by the lowest bidder on a government contract.”
 
Speaking of Challenger, thats now only the second worst decision anyone has ever made about those SRBs. Number one is slapping that godawful, tacky ‘America 250’ logo on them.
 
I'm a bit concerned that SpaceX are building some of the components, I think

Yes, SpaceX are probably cheaper and faster than the competitors - but they often take a Silicon Valley approach towards innovation (get it out of the door ASAP and if it doesn't work first time, we'll patch it later)

This is fine for software (where updates are free), but not so much hardware failure, which can be costly (Xbox 360 Red Ring of Death), and potentially even cause injury (OceanGate)
 
I‘m just glad they hit a daylight window, so we got more than just a bright white blob like Artemis I.

Imagine if, after all this hype, the next burn fails and they spend 10 days bobbing around in the Pacific instead 😂

oh, and whoever went and got the old Shuttle maguffin out the VAB to fix the FTS issue is the real hero of tonight!
 
Stage two has separated. Perigee raise burn currently in progress. Only ten days and three million points of failure to go.
 
I forgot to watch it live, but I saw the replay

Doesn't this prove that competition is important?

The USA was motivated to go into space in order to compete with the USSR, but lost interest once they won

However: now China and India are on the scene, the USA suddenly has renewed interest in space again

I remember George W Bush talking about going back to the moon, but I don't remember it going anywhere

P.S. Something I personally found interesting was the mini rocket built in Japan, as it proved that rockets don't need to be huge (the Japanese are masters at miniaturising products - hence why IBM asked them to design their ThinkPad)
 
Smudgy said:
It was really special to watch this live, not being alive during any of the prior moon missions.

Seeing humans launch into space, no matter the reason always fills me with so much hope for the future of our species.

Truly a great feeling.
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I agree. The last moon launch was 1972 (54 years ago), so nobody under the age of 60 years old or so would even remember it!

I wonder if the Apollo astronauts back then realised that it would be this long before the next journey

P.S. Prior to the first mission in 1969, some people had anticipated that the surface on the moon would be like quicksand, and that the astronauts would sink when they attempted to walk on it !
 
It was great to be able to watch this and see history being made! Hopefully the rest of the mission runs smoothly.

I’m disappointed at the lack of coverage on British television though, I think only BBC News channel was covering it live?
 
James said:
I’m disappointed at the lack of coverage on British television though, I think only BBC News channel was covering it live?
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The replay that I saw was on Sky News - although it was the YouTube feed, so I'm not sure if the terrestrial TV channel showed it as well?

Given that it was at midnight (British time) and there wasn't much else going on at the time, I'm surprised that more channels didn't broadcast it live.

P.S. I remember hearing in the Apollo 13 film that more people in America allegedly tuned in to watch a baseball game than the space launches post-Apollo 11, as the public quickly lost interest after Armstrong and Aldrin landed

P.P.S. I remember the Apollo 11 astronauts stating that, when they returned to Earth, it wasn't necessarily seen as strictly an American achievement, as people from many countries congratulated them and saw it as a victory for humanity in general (many of the key scientists came from Germany, I believe - which is partly why Saturn V used Prussian colours)

P.P.P.S. There are rumours that some Russian astronauts actually got lost in space, but the Soviet government never admitted it? (One of the fictional characters in Metal Gear Solid 3 was a lost cosmonaut, I think)
 
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Just been watching some replays, and on Everyday Astronaut’s stream, you can see the emergency evacuation zipwire baskets getting the heck out of there at liftoff 😂

 
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