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Ariane chief seems frustrated with SpaceX for driving down launch costs:
[...] chief executive of Ariane Group, Alain Charmeau, gave an interview to the German publication Der Spiegel. The interview was published in German, but a credible translation can be found here. During the interview, Charmeau expressed frustration with SpaceX and attributed its success to subsidized launches for the US government. [...] Even as Charmeau decries what he calls subsidies for SpaceX from the US government, he admits that Ariane cannot exist without guaranteed contracts purchased by European governments. To make the Ariane 6 vehicle viable, Charmeau said Ariane needs five launches in total for 2021 and eight guaranteed launches for 2022.
[...] Charmeau said the Ariane rocket does not launch often enough to justify the investment into reusability. (It would need about 30 launches a year to justify these costs, he said). And then Charmeau said something telling about why reusability doesn't make sense to a government-backed rocket company—jobs. "Let us say we had ten guaranteed launches per year in Europe and we had a rocket which we can use ten times—we would build exactly one rocket per year," he said. "That makes no sense. I cannot tell my teams: 'Goodbye, see you next year!'" This seems a moment of real irony. Whereas earlier in the interview Charmeau accuses the US government of subsidizing SpaceX, a few minutes later he says the Ariane Group can't make a reusable rocket because it would be too efficient.
China's first private rocket reaches 127,000 feet on maiden flight:
OneSpace Technology Co., a Beijing-based aerospace company, has successfully launched a suborbital rocket. This was the first flight for China's commercial launch sector.
[...] The mission was designated OS-X0 as it was the first test launch of OneSpace's OS-X rocket. During the flight, the launch vehicle reached an altitude of 127,106 feet (38.74 kilometers) and had a top speed of more than 5.7 times the speed of sound. This was confirmed by Shu Chang, the company's founder and CEO.
[...] OneSpace is not the only Chinese private company developing launch vehicles. Last year, Link Space, another Beijing-based startup, presented the design of its New Line 1 reusable rocket. That company is targeting 2020 for the first orbital flight of its booster.
Although the Space Launch System's promoters are focusing on the vehicle's payload capacity to trans-Lunar injection orbit, NASA now claims that the SLS Block 1's payload to LEO may be greater than the 70 metric tons originally estimated. This comes as the SLS project has been negatively compared to SpaceX's Falcon Heavy:
While a comparison between NASA's SLS Block 1 and SpaceX's Falcon Heavy is often made, the gulf between the two has actually widened. As the Block 1 design has matured, the agency has refined the vehicle's capabilities by a significant amount. Though NASA prefers to position SLS as a deep-space rocket, [Spaceflight Insider] sought a clarification of the vehicle's capabilities to a more common destination for rockets: low-Earth-orbit (LEO).
NASA replied: "Now that the SLS design has matured and the program has more data as a result of progress with hardware manufacturing and testing, our current analysis shows the Block 1 configuration of SLS can deliver an estimated mass of 95 metric tons (209,439 pounds) to low-Earth orbit based on a 200 by 200-kilometer orbit with a 28.5 degree inclination, which is a commonly used orbit in the industry for estimating performance."
See also:
Here's China's plan to compete with SpaceX and Blue Origin:
(Score: 4, Informative) by takyon on Wednesday May 23 2018, @01:05PM (2 children)
It would be neat to see BFR come well under the cost of Falcon 9, and then see how many small satellites can be deployed in one launch. If the rocket doesn't carry much mass, it will have more fuel to adjust into different orbits and still return for full reuse.
There are small launch providers that are offering a relatively cheap dedicated ride for small payloads, but they use expendable launchers that keep the price into the millions. SpaceX is hoping to prove that it can rapidly reuse a Falcon 9 within 24 hours or so. Yet there's no clear need for them to do so at this point (even at 50 launches a year, that's less than one per week, and that's out of 3-4 launch sites). It seems like a way to test the techniques needed for rapid reuse of the BFR. SpaceX is on track to create space capabilities so cheap that the market will have to adjust to take advantage of it (you'll see smaller companies and universities launching spacecraft and robots built with off-the-shelf parts to low-Earth orbit or the Moon).
Conversely, BFR could allow a heavy, "dumb" payload that does not need to be made from the lightest components possible or employ origami-like folding. There have been problems with the JWST related to folding [spaceflightnow.com]. If you can fit up to 150 metric tons into a huge fairing, you can send up a cheap but large telescope.
As for Neil deGrasse Tyson, he has made a career of talking a lot, and sharing opinions/predictions alongside some science facts. So there is no doubt that he will crash and burn on some subjects. He was also describing the situation as it was at the time (minimal commercial interest in space, with Beltway bandits being overfunded by the U.S. government) and probably coming from a place of trying to defend NASA (the public may incorrectly blame NASA for problems that are better blamed on Beltway bandits, Presidential administrations, and Congress). Has he admitted that he was mistaken about commercial spaceflight?
Is it really no more difficult to build a Falcon 9 than it is to build a B737? You could probably cut some corners or make mistakes with the B737 without killing anybody (on the maiden flight) whereas the Falcon 9 has to endure much more stress.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by frojack on Wednesday May 23 2018, @07:59PM (1 child)
No. Its a LOT simpler.
F9 is an incredibly simple rocket, as rockets go. It is levels of magnitude less complex than a 737,
even though it weighs 20 times as much.
These days your middle of the road 737-800 costs about $96.0 million.
F9 - Empty 549,054 kg (1,210,457 lb) Cost about $62 Million per launch.
However, SpaceX has a 40% profit margin on each launch, so the rocket direct
costs are about $36.7 million. 1/3 the cost of a new 737-800.
(First stage is estimated to cost $27 Million, or about 75% of the entire rocket.)
Figures from here http://spacenews.com/spacexs-reusable-falcon-9-what-are-the-real-cost-savings-for-customers/ [spacenews.com]
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 23 2018, @08:51PM
So it costs less, sure. But if a major mistake is made, the aircraft might still be able to land without killing all of the passengers. The Falcon 9 might be able to explode a little further from the ground.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]