I'm torn, I want to believe that the water cooled plate will work because I want starship to succeed, but at the same time I don't know why they haven't started digging a trench at cape Canaveral since that is where Artemis 3 will take off from.

[–] robbak@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 year ago

They can't dig a trench. The water table is often above the natural ground level, and their pads are only a few feet above that. When starship dug that hole, water seeped in and partially filled it!

But it is the same thing at the cape - but there they brought in soil and built up the land by something like 10 meters, and built their pads and trenches in that. Moving in that much dirt would take years.

[–] Oni_eyes@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I probably should have asked where they're launching from, whether it's one of their own built launch sites like Brownsville area or from a launch site like Canaveral.

I just remember that the last launch from Brownsville sent debris in all directions for a couple miles and damaged a lot of non SpaceX personal property like cars.

[–] shirro@aussie.zone 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

As far as I know the bulk of the damage to personal property was the expensive cameras used to record the launch and they would have been placed knowing there was a risk. The only significant damage to a car I saw was NSF's rustbucket camera platform which was parked in the restricted areas and was worth considerably less than the camera equipment mounted on it.

The failure of the pad surface and ejection of dirt and concrete was an avoidable and spectacular fuckup but not very impactful. The 1997 Delta IIR launch destroyed a lot more vehicles and China drops boosters on villages. SpaceX need to be held to a high standard and we expect them to demonstrate a better safety culture than China or Boeing. I don't think the pad is going to fail as spectacularly again though an explosion on the pad or shortly after lift off is still a frightening prospect.

[–] Oni_eyes@sh.itjust.works -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Oh I didn't mean totaled cars, but it straight hailed rocks/created an artificial sandstorm up to 6.5 miles away in Port Isabel.

I mean, yeah it's minor in all things considered but that's still hundreds of dollars per car in fixing paint and dents that probably won't be absorbed much by insurance, and Elon sure as fuck doesn't care about it.

Not to mention the nesting sites for endangered bird species and the Kemp's ridley sea turtle are pretty close to where they built the abomination called a launch pad.

Dunno why you're pulling China and Boeing into this when they weren't relevant to SpaceX going off half cocked as usual.

[–] ZacOmatic@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago

Oh I didn't mean totaled cars, but it straight hailed rocks/created an artificial sandstorm up to 6.5 miles away in Port Isabel.

I mean, yeah it's minor in all things considered but that's still hundreds of dollars per car in fixing paint and dents that probably won't be absorbed much by insurance, and Elon sure as fuck doesn't care about it.

I sure don't remember seeing what you're describing. The cars around town had a fine brown dust on them after the launch. Most people compared it to a light sandstorm and didn't give it a second thought. A few I talked to were annoyed by it, but that was all. I hung out for a few days afterward and I didn't come across anybody who had significant damage to anything.