After what SpaceX's founder Elon Musk called
an "embarrassing" glitch with Starhopper,
an experimental rocket ship, the company pulled
off an impressive launch and landing on 27th
August, Tuesday.
TheSpaceX Starhopper rocket took to the skies
for a second time, reaching a height of a
small skyscraper before landing back on Earth.
The flight demonstrated the vehicle’s ability
to take off and land in a controlled manner,
and it paves the way for more aggressive testing
of the vehicle’s design in the months ahead,
as Elon Musk’s company moves ever close
to reaching the Red Planet.
"Congrats SpaceX team!!"
Musk tweeted shortly after the attempt.
"One day Starship will land on the rusty sands
of Mars."
Starhopper is a roughly 60-foot-tall (18 meters)
vehicle and a squat steel prototype of a planned
Mars launch system called Starship.
It's located at SpaceX's rocket launch and
development facility near Boca Chica Beach,
Texas, at the southeastern tip of the state.
In this video Engineering Today will discuss
SpaceX Starhopper rocket prototype which takes
giant leap for Elon Musk’s dream to land
on the rusty sands of Mars.
Let’s get into details.
The test, commonly referred to as a “hop”
test, marked the highest flight yet of SpaceX’s
prototype, “Starhopper.”
Equipped with one main Raptor engine, the
vehicle flew for the first time on July 25th,
but it only got about 60 feet (18 meters)
off the ground, and the entire scene was shrouded
in plumes of exhaust.
Tuesday, SpaceX Starhopper provided a more
impressive sight when it took off from a pad
at SpaceX’s test site near Brownsville in
Boca Chica, Texas.
The vehicle took off vertically, slowly climbing
near to its target altitude.
Once there, the vehicle hovered in the air
a full minute, translated a short distance,
before using its Raptor engine to land gently
back down on a different pad, proving it can
maneuver while hovering.
The long-awaited test was intended to go to
an altitude of 500 feet (150 meters), although
it was not immediately clear from the webcast
of the flight exactly what altitude the vehicle
achieved.
The company provided no commentary for the
webcast, and ended it shortly after the vehicle
made what appeared to be a successful landing.
Musk said Tuesday's launch – While the flight
appeared to be a success, SpaceX has no plans
to fly Starhopper again.
The company will now move on to testing bigger
and more capable prototypes in pursuit of
Starship.
Its hope within the next few years is to develop
a final version of the fully reusable, two-stage
launch system.
This SpaceX Starhopper’s tests are supposed
to evaluate the design and hardware that’ll
be used on the company’s future Starship
rocket.
SpaceX is developing the monster spaceship
to send people and cargo to deep space destinations
like the Moon and Mars.
Towering around 180 feet (55 meters) tall,
Starship is meant to launch from Earth on
top of a giant rocket booster called Super
Heavy.
When it reaches other worlds, the vehicle
will land upright with its onboard methane
and oxygen-burning Raptor rocket engines,
similar to how SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rockets
land on the ground today.
It’s also supposed to take off again from
these distant destinations to return to Earth.
But first SpaceX needs to thoroughly test
its core technologies, many of which are new
– including the Raptor engine.
This SpaceX Starhopper has only been flying
with one Raptor.
Soon, SpaceX will add more engines to its
test flights.
The final Starship design calls for the spaceship
to have six Raptor engines.
Three will be optimized to work best in our
planet’s atmosphere at sea level, and the
other three will be designed to work best
in the vacuum of space.
Starhopper lifted off at about 6:02 pm ET
on Tuesday, or 5:02 pm local time, then landed
about 57 seconds later.
SpaceX's full video of the launch, showed
several live views of the stubby steel rocket
ship and its lone Raptor rocket engine taking
off.
As the engine ignites, the launch throws up
a thick cloud of fumes and dust.
The video feed then cuts to an aerial drone
view of the launchpad as Starhopper ascends.
The vehicle then gimbals or steers its Raptor
engine to move up and eastward as reaction
control thrusters – seen as puffs of white
smoke – keep the vehicle righted.
Then, in another chaotic cloud of dust and
smoke, lands on a concrete pad a few hundred
feet away.
SpaceX attempted to fly Starhopper on Auguest
26, Monday, but the attempt was scrubbed after
the Raptor engine failed to ignite, just 0.8
seconds left in the countdown.
SpaceX Chief Executive Elon Musk later tweeted
that “dual redundant torch igniters” in
the raptor engine appeared to have malfunctioned
and needed to be inspected before trying again.
"Igniters need to be inspected.
We will try again tomorrow same time," Musk
tweeted on Monday following the scrub.
He added that the cause was probably a wiring
or connector issue.
Overnight, he responded to a Twitter user
who questioned why there weren't any sensors
or other checks on the devices – which are
crucial to the rocket taking off – to verify
they are working.
"Yes, rather embarrassing," Musk replied.
Whatever SpaceX workers did to correct the
glitch apparently worked, though.
And now, with Starhopper's final flight in
the can, SpaceX can move forward with attaching
more of its Raptor engines to bigger and more
capable prototypes.
The company has been building two new Starship
prototype rockets: one at the South Texas
site and the other at an industrial site in
Cocoa, Florida.
The Florida version of Starship will be taken
by truck and barge to Cape Canaveral for test
flights.
These two test vehicles are a bit more robust
than the SpaceX Starhopper, which was never
meant to be a faithful replica of Starship.
Now SpaceX is working toward launching a larger
prototype, called Starship Mk1, which will
use three Raptor rocket engines and be capable
of launching from the Texas site, flying around
Earth, and landing back there.
SpaceX is building a similar yet competing
prototype in Florida called Starship Mk2.
The newer prototypes also will be equipped
with grid fins for steering and better landing
gear.
The two are meant to perform a series of hop
tests that could reach as high as 12 miles
(20 kilometers) up in the months ahead.
Eventually, SpaceX will fly prototypes that
are supposed to achieve orbit during the first
launches to space, once SpaceX finishes the
Super Heavy booster.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk also noted that the two
teams building these prototypes are in a friendly
race to reach space first.
However, the rules aren’t super strict,
it seems.
“A success by both in close proximity would
be amazing & each would count as a win,”
Musk tweeted in August.
Before SpaceX can launch either rudimentary
rocket ship, or any full-scale Starships,
the company needs sign-off from the Federal
Aviation Administration, FAA.
"Working on regulatory approval for both Boca
Chica, Texas, and Cape Kennedy, Florida,"
Musk tweeted in March.
"Will also be building Starship & Super Heavy
simultaneously in both locations."
Those vehicles are all stepping stones to
Starship, a roughly 18-story spaceship, and
Super Heavy, a roughly 23-story booster.
The launch system is also being designed for
full reusability, which may vastly reduce
the cost of accessing space.
SpaceX fired up Starhopper for the first time
in April.
That test secured the rocket ship with giant
bike-chain-like tethers on its legs, and the
vehicle lifted just a few inches off the ground.
On July 25, the vehicle made its first free
flight, rising about 60 feet, or 18 meters
off the pad before landing about 10 to 15
seconds later.
At the time, Musk said he expected a “hop”
to an altitude of 200 meters in “a week
or two.”
This flight, though, was delayed by issues
amending the company’s experimental permit
issued by the FAA’s Office of Commercial
Space Transportation.
“Need a bit more hazard analysis & should
be clear to fly soon,” Musk tweeted August
15th.
That revised permit was issued by the FAA
Aug. 23, but limited SpaceX to a single flight
of the vehicle to 150 meters altitude.
The permit also increased the third-party
liability insurance requirement from $3 million
to $100 million, reflecting the apparently
greater potential damage the vehicle could
do in the event of an accident.
SpaceX’s South Texas site is unusual in
that people live within a few kilometers of
what the company eventually plans to be an
orbital spaceport, in a subdivision called
Boca Chica Village that predates the site
by decades.
Residents of the subdivision reported on social
media that they were informed by local law
enforcement to stand outside of their homes
during the test, in case there were any problems
with the launch, which could have caused a
shockwave that shattered nearby windows.
Fortunately, there didn't turn out to be any
problems.
The spacecraft gracefully took to the air
after its engine roared to life, rising high
above the ground before shimmying sideways
and coming in for a gentle landing.
As the smoke cleared the vehicle looked in
good condition, and it will now be retired
after a job well done.
Workers will soon cannibalize it for parts
and turn it into a peculiar-looking test stand
for Raptor engines that will power SpaceX's
rockets of the future.
Now that this latest test is complete, Musk
is poised to give an update on the Starship’s
design and progress.
Originally, he planned to give a talk at Boca
Chica on August 24th, following the 500-foot
flight.
However, Musk pushed back the event after
the Federal Aviation Administration was slow
to approve Starhopper’s flight, forcing
SpaceX to delay the test until Monday, August
26th.
Musk recently suggested, it would be better
to hold the event once the “Starship Mark
1” vehicle at the site had three Raptor
engines installed, along with other components.
Musk estimated that to be completed in mid-September.
We all will be watching with bated breath
to see what comes next.
