SpaceX celebrated Starship's 1st launch. Some locals called it 'truly terrifying'

For a system design that intends for super heavy boosters to return directly to their launch towers and be able to fly multiple times in short periods, it seems like there is a lot of work to do on the launch facility itself. Obviously, a water suppression system is going to be needed so that spray instead of concrete gets blasted in all directions.

But, I have to wonder about the idea of having such a massive vehicle return directly to its launch infrastructure. It seems that it would need to be extremely reliable in its return, or otherwise the cost of the damage from destructive incidents would make the whole system design too expensive to keep operational.

I'm no Elon Musk, but I think I would have something like superheavy return to a catch tower that is well away from anything to do with the launch infrastructure, and then have it roll a few miles over to the launch pad in some way.
 
Apr 22, 2023
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I think it makes sense for the initial Starship launches to try to recover the super-heavy booster using an autonomous drone ship first and put legs in the super-heavy like Falcon 9. The Chopstick style recovery is going to take time to master.
 
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Apr 22, 2023
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I think it makes sense for the initial Starship launches to try to recover the super-heavy booster using an autonomous drone ship first and put legs in the super-heavy like Falcon 9. The Chopstick style recovery is going to take time to master.

They’re going to have to master not DESTROYING the area under the launch pad first
 
They’re going to have to master not DESTROYING the area under the launch pad first

Yes, they will need to design a better launch pad to deal with the launch-level thrust effects.

But, remember, for landing, they are not using all 33 engines and the ones used are not at full thrust, at least not for the same period of time near the landing pad. The launch thrust needs to deal with the weight of a lot more propellant plus the second stage, compared to the landing thrust. And the lift-off is much slower than the landing deceleration period. So, damage from landing should be far less than damage from lift-off.
 
Apr 24, 2023
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For a system design that intends for super heavy boosters to return directly to their launch towers and be able to fly multiple times in short periods, it seems like there is a lot of work to do on the launch facility itself. Obviously, a water suppression system is going to be needed so that spray instead of concrete gets blasted in all directions.

But, I have to wonder about the idea of having such a massive vehicle return directly to its launch infrastructure. It seems that it would need to be extremely reliable in its return, or otherwise the cost of the damage from destructive incidents would make the whole system design too expensive to keep operational.

I'm no Elon Musk, but I think I would have something like superheavy return to a catch tower that is well away from anything to do with the launch infrastructure, and then have it roll a few miles over to the launch pad in some way.
The idea to return the superheavy to the launch tower is intended to allow a quick relaunch. Having it launch elsewhere would result in having to move the returning vehicle back to the launch pad - adding more cost and time. Better to use this experience to develop a more robust launch pad to meet Musk's goals.
 
The idea to return the superheavy to the launch tower is intended to allow a quick relaunch. Having it launch elsewhere would result in having to move the returning vehicle back to the launch pad - adding more cost and time. Better to use this experience to develop a more robust launch pad to meet Musk's goals.

I understand the design concept. I am just questioning how realistic it is from a reliability standpoint.

If a single failure to catch a returning Superheavy booster does enough damage to the launch tower to take it out of the launch business for an extened period, the issue will be whether the net sustainable lauch frequency can be made higher by transporting recoverd boosters from separate recovery towers, or by repairing the damage to the launch towers every time a booster recovery goes awry. And there is also the cost difference to consider.

I guess we will see how it goes pretty soon.
 

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