Have you ever heard of a Jewish astronaut? We design the rockets only.
BTW, Ed Sullivan is a fricken racist.
Apparently, not everyone appreciates the Hose Himenez.
SpaceX’s Latest Successful Explosion
The Starship blew up in the sky, but that’s the way progress is made.
By The Editorial Board, WSJ
April 20, 2023 6:37 pm ET
he SpaceX Starship lifts off from the launchpad during a flight test from Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, April 20. Photo: Patrick T. Fallon/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Rocket launches are always a sight to behold, but it’s especially a spectacle when an unmanned test vehicle undergoes a “rapid unscheduled disassembly,” as SpaceX characterized it Thursday. That referred to the fiery ending of the first flight for the company’s Starship spacecraft atop a Super Heavy booster.
Roughly three minutes after liftoff, the rocket started to spin ominously. “We should have had separation by now,” the SpaceX announcer on the live stream said. “Obviously, this does not appear to be a nominal situation.” Gotta love the euphemisms in this business. That mild comment came shortly before the whole stack exploded in the sky.
Give SpaceX and founder Elon Musk credit for pushing the envelope, which is what produces technological progress. “Every great achievement throughout history has demanded some level of calculated risk, because with great risk comes great reward,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in a congratulatory note about the launch on Twitter. “Looking forward to all that SpaceX learns, to the next flight test—and beyond.”
NASA is hoping that a Starship variant will bring astronauts back to the moon in a few years, and Mr. Musk wants to make humans an interplanetary species by setting up civilizational shop on Mars. Those are big dreams. But SpaceX, which Mr. Musk founded in 2002, has already helped to revolutionize the launch industry, including with its partially reusable Falcon 9 rockets that land upright, an engineering feat that’s now routine.
SpaceX said the Starship launched Thursday reached a height of about 39 kilometers over the Gulf of Mexico, the highest to date: “The vehicle experienced multiple engines out during the flight test, lost altitude, and began to tumble. The flight termination system was commanded on both the booster and ship.” The rocket scientists will soon be back at work, if they aren’t already, figuring out the lessons.
“There’s a million ways this rocket could fail,” Mr. Musk said before the flight. Finding them all, to channel Thomas Edison, is the way to eventually get a ride to the moon that works.
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