I remember it like it was yesterday. I was in the 4th grade and Ms. Rawa was my teacher. The principal knocked on the door and asked to speak to her outside the classroom. A minute later, she came back in and was sobbing. The room went dead silent. When she composed herself, she told the class that the Space Shuttle Challenger had exploded. I was devastated.
I’ve always been a space geek. Even as a young child, I would watch every liftoff with great excitement. To me, space travel represents the best of humankind. Sending an object into space is the pinnacle of engineering. And landing a 160-foot tall rocket from space may just be the pinnacle of the pinnacle.
On Tuesday, I watched the SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch and I could barely contain my excitement. My normal resting heart rate is in the low 60s. About a minute into the launch, I noticed that my heart was racing. I looked down at my fitness watch and my heart rate was in the low 130s. I was just sitting there.
Elon Musk did it. His Tesla is in orbit. He landed two out of three of his rockets. What a day to be a human. We live in incredible times.
The dark is generous and it is patient and it always wins – but in the heart of its strength lies its weakness: one lone candle is enough to hold it back.
Love is more than a candle.
Love can ignite the stars.
–Matthew Stover, Revenge of the Sith
Join the 10s who have signed up already!
Subscribing will improve your life in incredible ways*.
*Only if your life is pretty bad to begin with.
You’re missing the camera angle that read DON’T PANIC! =)
Mrs PoP recently posted…Ooops, We Live Blogged The Flash Crash. Kindof.
Yeah, the Hitchhiker’s reference was great! Go Musk go!!!!
I hope the dummy remembered his towel. =)
Mrs PoP recently posted…Ooops, We Live Blogged The Flash Crash. Kindof.
I was crying with joy when that thing passed max q and I realized it probably wasn’t going to blow up — and my breath stopped altogether for a while when those boosters were landing back at Canaveral. This has the potential to be earth-shattering stuff.
Back in the early ’00s, my dad headed up NASA’s Rapid Spacecraft Development Office; it was his responsibility to find ways to make routine launches faster and cheaper. He’s over the moon (pun intended) about Falcon Heavy.
I still get the shakes 22 hours later when I really think about what happened yesterday afternoon. I mean, wow!
YES! This is one of those moments I’ll always remember. One of the top 5. Completely amazing.
Humankind lept forward a couple of steps yesterday.
I had watery eyes too.
And wow, your dad had an awesome job! At least it sounds that way!
I wonder who came up with the idea for a landing rocket?
My money’s on Philip Nowlan, creator of Buck Rogers. 😉
Nice one!
The boosters landing is one of those jaw-dropping moments that you just can’t turn your eyes away from. Anyone who doesn’t think that’s the coolest darn thing in the world needs their pulse checked!
Accidental FIRE recently posted…Just Say No To A Tax Refund
Yep. I don’t think people realize just what a monumental feat this is. You’re landing massive objects from space. It’s insane when you start thinking about it. Go SpaceX!
Agree! That synchronized landing was amazing. What really floors me is how they can land boosters on a drone ship AT SEA!!! Too bad it didn’t work out this time, but I understand the center core was a radical departure from their typical falcon design.
Carl – I almost mentioned the Challenger news in my post as well yesterday. I just couldn’t bring myself to include that. I remember vividly hearing the somber art teacher share the news with us – 7th grade. We are all shaken up by that.
Booster landing–definitely the shape of the future. Thanks for your work here Mr 1500. You’ve inspired me along the way as I stumbled into the FI world a few months ago. We appreciate! (Trying not to focus on a volatile market!) I hope my index funds have lots of TSLA.
Volatility means nothing to the long-term investor. 🙂 Years from now, these will just be little market farts; barely detectable because the passage of time smoothed them out.
And thanks for the kind comment!
Nice quick summary. It was a great moment and very exciting.
We used to watch the shuttle launches in our high school library… it was very painful when we heard the Challenger was destroyed – we had a school wide assembly announcement after. And then I was in my car driving, listening to NPR, when the Columbia broke apart…
Leaving the planet and exploring space is audacious and awe inspiring and very very difficult. Some of the work Elon’s companies are doing is truly amazing. The video of the two boosters landing looks like something out of a 1960’s James Bond film – it doesn’t seem real.
I don’t think we’ll be easily jaunting off to space for vacation in my lifetime, but the tech advances are amazing!
My hope is that if we can eventually get enough people into space, the ‘overview effect’ will kick in and humanity will work harder on not being such jerks.
On a less serious note… you opposite interests in dinosaurs + space flight = a potential comic book/stop motion film/cartoon future!
When the Columbia disintegrated, I was on 290 driving out of Chicago. That one was less dramatic, but just as awful.
“My hope is that if we can eventually get enough people into space, the ‘overview effect’ will kick in and humanity will work harder on not being such jerks.”
We can dream, can’t we? On that note, maybe Musk should have sent a pickup truck into space to appeal to a wider demographic? 🙂
“On a less serious note… you opposite interests in dinosaurs + space flight = a potential comic book/stop motion film/cartoon future!”
Haha, Dinosaurs in Space? Spaceosaurus Rex? I need more time!
It was a pretty darn cool thing to watch, that’s for sure!
Best marketing stunt ever by a car maker, don’t you think?
Haha! Musk is quite the showman. It must be fun to be an eccentric billionaire. If I had his money, I’d probably buy an island somewhere and launch a nefarious plot. Just kidding. Maybe…
Thank you for the Matthew Stover quote-that brought tears to my eyes.
And the launch thing is really cool too.
That quote is awesome. I never thought that I’d come across something like that in a Star Wars book!
Okay, reality check here…yes, landing a spent rocket for reuse looks cool. But what I’d like to see is the actual refurbishment cost to return the spent rocket back into use. And not the fake numbers of “actual costs” being used at Tesla. From my experience in military/aerospace refurbishment of equipment, specifically EDM units (Engineering Development Models), refurbishment is not too far from replacement cost.. Why? The physical abuse the rocket undergoes is torturous. I had to keep an Engineering Log book for government representatives to review and inspect everything that we refurbished before equipement went back into service. I participated in heavy weight shock testing, vibration testing, thermal cycling, RMF, etc. But yeah, returning a rocket on it’s tail looks cool. 😉
“Fake numbers”! Haha! I see your point though; Musk is quite the showman who always overpromises. He usually delivers though even if it is years late.
I did a little poking around and found this: https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/05/spacex-spent-less-than-half-the-cost-of-a-new-first-stage-on-falcon-9-relaunch/
The most incredible thing though is if SpaceX can achieve 24 hour turnaround time like Tom Mueller (rocket engineer at SpaceX) promises: https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2017/08/spacex-falcon-9-block-5-targets-24-hour-turnaround-no-refurbishment-reuse-and-relaunch-a-dozen-times.html
Like you said, rockets perform at the limits. It will be interesting to see how reliable they are after a number of launches.
Yeah, I know about that TechCrunch article.. I still don’t believe the Musk published numbers. Let’s see what the long-term contracts are for Space X and the resulting profit margin. Oh, and the 24 hr turn-around is not needed once you have a few used rockets in inventory.
I thought that the rockets coming back and setting themselves down was the most impressive part about the story!
Money Beagle recently posted…Why It’s OK To Get A Tax Refund
Absolutely.
I watched the launch with my son. I think I was more excited than he was!
I’ll buy the first round of drinks at FinCon Mars!!
Budget On a Stick recently posted…Daycare to Degree: How to pay for college?
“I’ll buy the first round of drinks at FinCon Mars!!”
I’m holding you to it!
I am old enough to remember the last of the moon landings, as well as all the shuttle missions. I was a senior in college when the Challenger blew up.
I believe it is our future to live among the stars, and my hat is off to Mr. Musk for making this happen.
Mr. 39 Months
Watch, with audio. The close up was cool but this really gives you a sense of the speed they come in with.
https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/7w6tcg/best_video_ive_seen_yet_on_the_dual_sidebooster/
Holy shit, that is so awesome.
If you watch some of the videos of the landing shot from the ground, you get to hear double sonic booms as those things come back in.
Yeah, I saw that video. Amazing. I must get down to see one of these up close and personal.