Another Dragon Visits ISS
Dragon Berthed at the International Space Station
“ISS Commander Koichi Wakata of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, with the assistance of NASA’s Rick Mastracchio, successfully berthed the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft at the space station at 9:06 a.m. EDT.”
Any word on the booster soft landing test?
From all accounts, it went as well as could be expected. A soft splash-down with the booster remaining in contact with the relay plane until it toppled over horizontal.
Apparently it was a success, according to Musk they did not have any problems with roll like last time, it arrived at the targeted landing spot and continued sending telemetry for nearly ten seconds after impacting the water which indicates that it did not break up. However rough seas prevented their boats from going to the recovery area right away. Musk indicated that even if they aren’t able to recover it they got plenty of good data
From the SpaceX FB page: “Data upload from tracking plane shows first stage landing in Atlantic was good! Flight computers continued transmitting for 8 seconds after reaching the water. Stopped when booster went horizontal. Several boats enroute through heavy seas…” I assume that by “shows first stage landing was good”, SpaceX means the velocity at “touchdown” was what they wanted to see.
good to hear, thanks for the extra info, I was looking for something, but never would have thought of FB haha
I have not heard anything. Maybe it sank or they took the weekend off. There has been a storm sitting on top of the splash down. The Gulf Stream should be sending it to England if it is floating. The Shuttle SRB use to land vertical and stay vertical. This was because it would trap and compress air to the top. They put a plug in the bottom. Pump in air to force the water out and it would be horizontal. They would tow it back. Will they try to tow Falcon back or lift it out of the water their? I would be very surprised if it is floating perfectly horizontal so it could be towed. Maybe the tanks equal the 9000lb of engines. Just looking I would say the balance is about 25% up from the tail. Maybe there will be some news today.
Since no news and instead of guessing I tried to see if it would float. I could not find the weight. The height I found one place that said 150′. Take off for the engines and inter-tank. Getting the cubic’ x lb. of h2o= 911,000lb. If my math is correct. Only 9000lb. for engines. The tanks should not be much more. So Elon is correct. It is riding like a pop can. A little down in the tail. I read they will tow it to SC. They say they have a landing craft. It might fit inside or they may tow it back. I should quit guessing.
Johnson: Have you found it yet?
Shotwell: “Yes, we’ve found it.”
Johnson: Can you tell us what you found?
Shotwell: Not at this time, I haven’t seen all the photos. We’ve seen parts (laughs)!”
Johnson: Is there going to be video or photos released?
Shotwell: “I think we have some video. We didn’t have any real-time telemetry and video, so I haven’t seen it yet, I haven’t been back in the office.”
http://www.spaceflightinsid…
If not mistaken, this year should be the last that NASA ends its reliance upon Russian Progress ships for supplies? It’s fair to assume that with this fourth overall Dragon cargo ship SpaceX is achieving a steady level of maturity which surely gives it a leg up over its rivals in commercial crew. KSC Pad 39A is also the choice for human launches of Dragon, so if SpaceX is not selected by NASA then (imho) it would be outrageous.
No. Russia will use Progress ships. USA never had much on the Progress. Shuttle, ATV,HTV.Dragon,Cygnus carried or carry supplies for the USA section.
While driving to work with a few cups of coffee I was thinking about exploration. And wondering what it is that excites me about about Space eXploration. It’s not exploration at all!
It is Progress!!!
Last week Spacex hopped their F 9 R in Texas,
And Friday once again NASA, together with Spacex is doing cutting edge rocket science like back in the sixties which will lead to Progress.
Maybe NASA should try to sell Progress instead of exploration. The average Joe could understand progress that might help him or his kids one day I think?????
Hey, that’s a great idea, in fact I thinki that was what NACA did before they became NASA and got distracted by the Moon Race.
(sorry, duplicate thread)
Folks:
So, what is it, the eleventh successful SpaceX launch?
2 Falcon 1s
1 boiler plate Dragon (first Falcon 9 launch)
1 first Dragon capsule (Free flight and return)
1 COTS Dragon to ISS.
2 CRS Dragons to ISS.
1 First flight of Falcon 9 v1.1, first satellite with fairing, first polar orbit, first launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base.
2 commercial satelliites launched from Florida.
1 first Dragon launched on Falcon 9 v1.1 to ISS.
Yep, eleven. A pretty impressive itinerary too.
Data from the booster splash-down looks like SpaceX nailed that one too!
There’s hope…
tinker
It’s #9. The Orbcomm flight ail be F9 10.
1. Dragon boiler plate
2. COTS 1-2 (orbit)
3. COTS 2+ (to ISS)
4. CRS-1
5. CRS-2
6. CASSIOPE
7. SES-8
8. Thaicom 6
9. CRS-3
Tinker is talking about overall number of launches and added on the two successful launches of the now-cancelled Falcon-1.
Todd:
I included the two Falcon I flights from the Marshal Islands as well. They count as successful even though there wasn’t many folks following them back then.
tinker
The Wagon Train with picks and shovels. Another nail in the coffin of NASA building their own rocket ships, i.e. SLS and Orion.
People! I know, you know, the following ain’t much. Our so called representatives in Washington or even local respond to big money and big votes. Planetary Society (P.S.) has a template that any one can use to send a message. P.S. sends it to your specific Reps and the W.H. P.S. has sent 10s of thousands of letters this way. Add yours, it adds up (a little) and heck it doesn’t take long. And make sure to modify the letter to not just be Planetary Science specific but NASA as a whole; target SLS/Orion because it is the 800 lb gorilla. Put your own thoughts into the letter. Go to http://www.planetary.org/ge… Find “Take Action” Select the Link below it “Write to Congress”
Was this a new-build or a reused Dragon? If not a reused one, does anybody know which mission will be the first re-flight of a Dragon?
new. All NASA missions will be using a new Dragon.
first re-flight will probably be a DragonLab flight.
Well bummer. When did that change? Wikipedia still calls it a “partially reusable spacecraft.”
it still is intended to be reusable. however, as part of the CRS contract, NASA is requiring SpaceX to build a new Dragon for every delivery to the ISS. SpaceX could later use those Dragons again for DragonLab flights, etc.
Big difference between intended and demonstrated. Disapointing that the shuttle remains the only reusable system to have flown (barring possibly a couple Almaz flights and the suborbital X-15 & SS1) and the next actual reusable system to fly seems to remain just beyond the horizon.
that’s SpaceX’s concern. they’re working on reusability, so they’re the ones who need to worry about it. you can go to sleep or something.
No need for you to get snippy. Given that the bulk of their funding is NASA money, as a taxpayer it’s my business to worry about it.
i wish you’d worry about the things that the government actually wastes money on.
SpaceX is developing reusability on its OWN dime, NASA is not funding their efforts in this regard.
Something I’ve been dying to ask all weekend. Rewatch the launch footage — right at ignition, look at the plume of black material blow up the stack! Did someone forget to sweep under the rocket before launch? By T+3-5, look at the side of the booster – it got so dirty (all the way up to the second stage or more) that at first watch I wondered if the stage got singed! Very unusual.. I looked back later to previous Falcon launches and did not see anything similar. Anyone got an idea of what happened, and if there should be any concern?
Elon Musk and other spacex sources have said it was just dirty water from the rainbirds that splashed up onto the rocket.
Here is what I heard from people who were involved in the launch countdown. There was an internal liquid oxygen (LOX) leak in the vehicle chill down system, which kept slowly flowing LOX, which ends up spilling on the pad equipment below. So, to protect the pad equipment, they started the “rainbird” water earlier than in previous launches. Evidently, this extra water remained in the flame trench until the first stage ignited. The resulting up-splash of dirty water was unexpected to them (and certainly spectacular to everyone). I’m sure SpaceX will be taking steps in the future to prevent this from happening again. They did not like making their rocket dirty! I’m guessing they could either improve the flame trench drainage or perhaps pump the water out of the trench if it gets above certain level.