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from the the-inconceivable-has-become-commonplace dept.
SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink internet satellites from Cape Canaveral:
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched 60 more Starlink internet relay satellites on Saturday, boosting the total number launched to date to 895 as the company builds out a planned constellation of thousands designed to provide global high-speed broadband service.
Running two days late because of an on-board camera issue, the Falcon 9's twice-flown first stage thundered to life at 11:31 a.m. EDT, pushing the 229-foot-tall rocket away from pad 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. It was the California rocket builder's 19th launch so far this year and its 15th Starlink flight.
[...] With Saturday's launch, SpaceX has put 895 Starlinks into orbit, 180 of them — more satellites than any other company owns — in less than three weeks.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday October 26 2020, @08:39PM (2 children)
Yeah, rocket science is still hard. It's one thing to shoot a rocket up high enough to theoretically hit something zipping around the earth. It's much harder to put that rocket where you want it at just the the right time to actually damage something. Now, if all you wanted was chaos, you might could do some sort of splintered shot that cluttered up the roadway so to speak, like tire spikes. Still, Space is Big and you'd be more likely to have just made a giant rocket that goes up, makes a mess and that's it.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 26 2020, @09:22PM (1 child)
I agree it's not trivial. Since a satellite's orbital place and velocity are pretty much constant, its exact position at any point in time is known before launch though. If you have a recorded velocity profile of your rocket, you can calculate where to exactly aim it at before launch. Your flight computer just needs to make some minor course corrections due to atmospheric conditions, which should become negligible by the time of burnout.
A modern commercial drone seems to be able to cope fine with wind throwing it off course. Would it work well enough for a rocket going much faster and effectively moving in 3D space instead of just the XY needed for keeping a drone in position over ground? I don't know, but GPS should work all the way up.
I have not played Kerbal Space Program but I hear it's not *terribly* hard, so not sure if "rocket science" carries the same connotation as it used to in the days of Apollo :)
I for one would welcome some nightly fireworks as a compensation for having all my night sky pics ruined.
(Score: 3, Funny) by PiMuNu on Tuesday October 27 2020, @07:25AM
> I have not played Kerbal Space Program but I hear it's not *terribly* hard
LOL. Thanks for the informed comment.