llamacoffee @ llamacoffee @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

Here is the actual application. Typo is on page 79, the actual figure is in the appendix on page 177.

https://www.tceq.texas.gov/downloads/permitting/wastewater/title-iv/tpdes/wq0005462000-spaceexplorationtechnologiescorp-starbaselaunchpadsite-cameron-tpdes-adminpackage.pdf

https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1823378186836889699

CNBC updated its story yesterday with additional factually inaccurate information.

While there may be a typo in one table of the initial TCEQ's public version of the permit application, the rest of the application and the lab reports clearly states that levels of Mercury found in non-stormwater discharge associated with the water deluge system are well below state and federal water quality criteria (of no higher than 2.1 micrograms per liter for acute aquatic toxicity), and are, in most instances, non-detectable.

The initial application was updated within 30 days to correct the typo and TCEQ is updating the application to reflect the correction.

Planetary Protection is one of my absolute FAVORITE can of worms!! Obviously it is a good idea to be careful and mindful, but I personally believe that NASA's current policies are complete overkill.

Let's think this through. Why don't we want to bring earth life to another world?

Maybe because then we won't be able to tell whether it is indigenous or not? Baloney! Imagine you accidentally bring a lizard to an island that doesn't have them. If it is indigenous, there would be evidence of them being there in the past, through fossils or otherwise!

Maybe we don't want to infect any life that is on that other planet, that earth life could take over that ecosystem like an invasive species? Astronomically unlikely. All earth life is evolved to live in its specific environment and to interact with the species with which it has evolved alongside. As such, totally unrelated organisms form different planets would be so completely alien to each other that they would be unlikely to interact to begin with. Additionally Mars, for example, definitively has no macro-fauna or flora. As such, any possible microbes on Mars would be completely at a loss on how to interact with humans or indeed any earth life.

Finally, Earth and Mars, for example, exchange ~500 kilograms of material every year. Analysis shows that some of that material never exceeded a temperature high enough for sterilization. Thus, if there was any life on mars, it would have reached us by now, living in our biosphere along with us.

Anyways I'm a big nerd and I hope this stuff is interesting!

https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/06/mars-enthusiast-planetary-protection-a-racket-should-be-largely-ignored/

If a rocket gets to orbit, it most certainly hasn't blown up ;) Furthermore if it is reusable (which only SpaceX has) then it doesn't even crash into the ocean.

Let's be very clear on what rockets generally do. Last year, there were just over 200 launches worldwide (a world record, btw). ~10 of these sent professional astronauts to space stations. The rest deployed satellites that do all sorts of amazing things, including astronomy research, weather and earth observation, and communications. If 1 or 2 are a tourist flight, what's the big deal?

Good point! Truth is, it is basically space tourism. Now, because of the demand for science by humans in orbit, there will be science done and data gathered on the trip, but that isn't really its purpose. That being said, this kind of orbit brings some very interesting challenges re launch, radiation, and recovery, but I'm sure SpaceX can easily manage that.

On the tourism side, the orbit is actually quite noteworthy. We'll have to see what the actual figures are, but even at 450km, you're really quite close to the planet. As such, the sights they will see due to high inclination especially over the poles will be unlike anything any human has seen before, and that's exciting to me :)

Possible Cygnus Issue

Cygnus NG-21: Mission control just alerted the ISS crew to a possible issue with the Cygnus cargo ship: "Just to let you guys know, good comm with Cygnus, we're going to have solar array deploy in about an hour. The first two burns were not performed by Cygnus, so they're re-assessing what's the current state of the burn plan. We're hoping to still keep Tuesday (for capture by ISS), but we'll re-assess once we figure out what went wrong with the first two burns."

Performance stats of previous versions:

Raptor 1 (sea level variant)

Thrust: 185tf

Specific impulse: 350s

Engine mass: 2080kg

Engine + vehicle-side commodities and hardware mass: 3630kg

Raptor 2 (sea level variant)

Thrust: 230tf

Specific impulse: 347s

Engine mass: 1630kg

Engine + vehicle-side commodities and hardware mass: 2875kg

Raptor 3 is designed for rapid reuse, eliminating the need for engine heatshields while continuing to increase performance and manufacturability

Hands down one of the coolest shots I've ever seen!