SpaceX failed to launch the largest booster in human history

23

Today, Elon Musk and his SpaceX made the second attempt to launch the largest launch vehicle in the history of mankind. The super-heavy SuperHeavy rocket with the Starship spacecraft took off at 16:33 Moscow time from the private Boca Chica space center in Texas.


At about 16:35 Moscow time at an altitude of 38 km, the launch vehicle entered an uncontrolled rotation and exploded.



Starship is Elon Musk's ambitious project for deep space missions. It is being developed as a fully reusable transportation system designed to deliver crew and cargo to Earth orbit, assist humanity in returning to the Moon, and traveling to Mars and beyond.

The launch vehicle is 120 meters high and has a launch weight of more than 5000 tons, equipped with 33 Raptor engines. Before launch, 4800 tons of rocket fuel were filled into it, so the worst thing that could happen during the first launch was an explosion. Fortunately, the launch was successful and the unique launch pad was not destroyed.

According to the plan for the first SuperHeavy flight, the launch vehicle was supposed to make a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico 8 km from the US coast 30 minutes after launch. The Starship upper-stage spacecraft will make an incomplete circle around the Earth and fall into the Pacific Ocean near the Hawaiian archipelago about an hour and a half after liftoff.

To launch the spacecraft, SpaceX has built the world's largest launch pad. The Starship tower has a height of 146 meters and in the future will not only launch the launch vehicle, but also capture it back. The launch of a superheavy rocket will be of great importance for the further development of world cosmonautics, especially in the field of long-range flights. We will remind, earlier Elon Musk promised that a person will set foot on the surface of Mars in 2026.
23 comments
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  1. Boniface
    Boniface
    -4
    April 20 2023 16: 43
    I watched the broadcast of the Start! ! THIS IS AWESOME!!!! good
    Calculations are correct! The rocket reached a height of 35 km! control will be established! !!!
    I am delighted!

    1. Dmitry Volkov
      Dmitry Volkov
      +6
      April 20 2023 16: 53
      You still say that they were on the moon laughing
      These weren’t like that in space until the end of the 70s, all fakes and their rockets are fakes, on our engines ...
      1. Vox Populi
        Vox Populi
        -4
        April 20 2023 17: 37
        Quote: Dmitry Volkov
        You still say that they were on the moon laughing
        These weren’t like that in space until the end of the 70s, all fakes and their rockets are fakes, on our engines ...

        Where do you come from, such "experts / specialists"? lol
      2. Vega (Eugene)
        Vega (Eugene)
        -1
        April 20 2023 18: 50
        Well then, all Soviet specialists who recognized their flight are liars. Including Leonov is a liar.
    2. mister-red
      mister-red
      +5
      April 20 2023 19: 42
      The N-1 rocket had almost the same number of engines and no computers, and reached 4 km from the 40th time. Two of the first three emergency launches were associated with the operation of the KORD system, which turned off the engines in case of failures. If there were computers, I would have flown the second time. And that was 50 years ago.
    3. Wooh
      Wooh
      0
      April 22 2023 09: 52
      I am delighted!

      Well, you are not Boniface, but Woland! bully
      33 engines! Only pale-faced people step on the same rake twice. The Soviet rocket N-1 (1960-67) also had 30 NK-33 engines (11D111), which worked perfectly separately. But when they were crammed together, it turned out the same as now with Elon Musk. In the USSR, 4 unsuccessful launches, 4 explosions and the project was closed. As the great leader Lukich used to say: "comrade Mask, you go with a great doggogo." The audience is looking for entertainment.
      drinks
  2. Afinogen
    Afinogen
    +5
    April 20 2023 16: 55
    went into an uncontrolled rotation and exploded.

    That's why you need to shoot flights to the moon, Mars in the pavilions of film studios, as in the good old days lol It is much cheaper and the astronauts will not suffer.
  3. Irek
    Irek
    +3
    April 20 2023 16: 59
    And this is not it, exploded over Kiev? Musk can get a claim for compensation for moral damages for spoiled shalwars.
  4. Colonel Kudasov
    Colonel Kudasov
    +5
    April 20 2023 17: 05
    The fact that the rocket exploded not at the start, but at a height, is this a type of success?
    1. Vladimir80
      Vladimir80
      -5
      April 20 2023 17: 07
      this is not a success, but progress is evident ... of course, the cost of one such launch is interesting, although the mask has no problems with money ...
      ps I’m also wondering why their starting “table” is so miniature, at Baikonur and Eastern it is many times larger, as it seems to me!
  5. Virtuosi
    Virtuosi
    -5
    April 20 2023 17: 26
    In space, everyone is equal, we are people outside the stratosphere, there are no peoples and there should be no interests of individual countries, there is only Humanity, and it seems that only a small circle of people are trying to do at least something to resettle people. I hope Musk does well! Someone has to move this direction forward! Maybe ours will catch up there. I hope in my lifetime to walk on the surface, if not Mars, then at least the Moon ..
  6. rotkiv04
    rotkiv04
    -3
    April 20 2023 17: 46
    this is of course just a monster, impressive, here you can say gringo and respect
  7. Irek
    Irek
    +6
    April 20 2023 17: 51
    Here's what came...


    Already moved...


    We even made contact...

  8. Cucumbers
    Cucumbers
    0
    April 20 2023 20: 27
    In 2020, in my commentary (more about the prototype), I called this Musk's creation: a prop rocket. It reminds me of the first computer, so huge the size of a room. I think for flights to other planets you need something else. Another engine. Such a number of engines as Musk's is difficult to reconcile
  9. ont65
    ont65
    +4
    April 20 2023 23: 15
    The picture shows that the system turned off 6 engines. When the total power drops below the permissible thrust limit, the computer has nothing to compensate for their shutdown, the rocket starts to twist and it falls apart. Obviously, it will be necessary to revise the pressure in the chambers downward, and this will most likely lead to a recalculation of the entire structure. There are no other ways to increase reliability and reach a 3-fold margin, but before it, like cancer before Moscow. Until now, Musk's burnout during tests did not exceed a quarter, apparently there are not enough opportunities in this regard, because he himself did not have confidence. The problems of H-1 are still relevant today.
    1. Vladimir80
      Vladimir80
      +1
      April 21 2023 08: 51
      At the time of H1 there were no such perfect control systems as today
  10. Alex D
    Alex D
    0
    April 22 2023 13: 51
    A large pile of metal was launched. And what? Is it like mega cool?
  11. Firuz Ebrahim
    Firuz Ebrahim
    0
    April 23 2023 12: 48
    With all this achievement of science and technology, which is objectively great for our time, we have to admit the extreme, from the point of view of the future, inefficiency of technical solutions, maybe even the primitiveness of the current level. Indeed, in the five thousandth launch mass of the ship, only in the first stage is 3300 tons (about 68%), and the payload is only 50 tons. In fact, an improved next barrel of fuel, the efficiency of which is 1%. It's up to the discovery and use of yet unknown physical principles of overcoming the earth's gravity.
    1. hellman anton
      hellman anton
      0
      April 23 2023 13: 01
      Physics has left the chat, what unknown physical principles do you want to use?
      1. isofat
        isofat
        0
        April 23 2023 13: 54
        hellman anton, physics is needed only for successful launches. Yes
  12. shiva
    shiva
    0
    1 May 2023 19: 27
    We have 100 trouble-free launches. And why? Pop conducts a rite of consecration before launching. But Elon is not - that's the result - the rocket ..kicked on the firmament.
    But seriously, yes, more engines - more problems. This is already a fact. We need a new solution. Korolev came up with separable stages - for its time it was a breakthrough. But then everything hit the ceiling of the possibilities of technology, as it is now.
    So either a new design solution, or other principles for the whole idea as a whole.
    1. shiva
      shiva
      0
      1 May 2023 19: 42
      I propose an idea - airships. stratospheric launch pad. Small blocks are delivered to it by air controlled balls. There it is all mounted - and voila. Instead of burning thousands of tons of fuel, it takes much less to get off the ground. And from there into orbit, to the Lagrange point. You need not 3 steps, you need three sections of the path
      1. shiva
        shiva
        0
        1 May 2023 19: 47
        Elon, how do you like this idea? I give, for the benefit of all mankind