Imagine how a giant rocket of about 394 feet tall and 30 feet wide, will burn highly inflammable
gas at high temperature through 39 engines, that’s of course an insane flame.
But spacex tries to develop the starship in a way that it can withstand a consistent burn
at high temperature while journeying from Earth to Mars.
This is not yet confirmed as the starship was only tested in less than 40 second during
its static fire test.
That is why the CEO of spacex Elon Musk understands that if the starship launches into space now,
it has only a 50 percent chance to succeed.
In his words he said;
“There is only a 50 per cent chance that the first-ever orbital mission of SpaceX's
huge Starship vehicle will be a success”
This basically means that something terrible will happen to the starship if it takes a
flight to space at this time even though the FAA grants the launch permit.
So why will the starship explode? and why is Elon Musk not confident about the success
of the starship at its first orbital test flight?
Let’s find out answers to all these questions in today’s episode of tech spacex.
Since Elon Musk started developing the starship, a total of 4 Starship prototypes that have
been launched faced drastic explosion.
These explosions occurred during the testing phase, and of course that is normal since
the company was still testing what will work.
The explosions happened during various stages of testing, including ground testing, low-altitude
flight tests, and high-altitude flight tests.
Now dating back to history, a terrible rocket explosion once happened, that caused a disaster
that broke the heart of the Soviet Union.
It all happened in the 60s, when the United States and the Soviet Union were both trying
to get to the moon first, the Soviet N1 rocket was the key to the Soviet Union's plans.
But it was hard to build because of technical problems and setbacks, and in 1969 it blew
up in a terrible way.
The N1 rocket was meant to be the Soviet Union's answer to the Saturn V rocket in the United
States.
As part of the Soviet Union's ambitious plan to explore the moon, it was meant to be able
to carry a manned lunar lander and other payloads into space.
But there were a lot of technical problems and mistakes in the development of the N1
rocket.
On February 21th, 1969, the N1 rocket made its first moves in a series of test launches,
but all the test were not successful.
Before it completely disintegrated, the rocket was only able to climb a few hundred meters
in the air before it started to veer off course.
After all findings, it was gathered that the explosion was brought on by a malfunction
in one of the rocket's engines.
Despite these setbacks, the Soviet Union persevered with its lunar program and continued to make
progress.
On July 3rd, 1969, there was supposed to be a launch of the N1 rocket for a second test.
This attempt to launch the rocket also ended in failure when the rocket blew up mere seconds
after it had lifted off.
The explosion was so powerful that it destroyed the launch pad as well as the buildings in
the surrounding area, leading to a disastrous property damage and multiple fatalities.
After some findings, it was discovered that a catastrophic failure in one of the rocket's
engines was the root cause of the second explosion.
The turbopump in the engine, which was the part that was responsible for supplying fuel
to the engine, had broken down.
This resulted in a large fireball that was responsible for destroying both the rocket
and the launch pad.
The Soviet Union's space program and its efforts to compete with those of the United States
in the race to the moon was tarnished because it faced significant setbacks when the N1
rocket program was unable to be successfully completed.
After a total of four unsuccessful test launches, the program was eventually scrapped in the
year 1974.
The Soviet Union did not accomplish a successful moon landing until 1970, when the unmanned
spacecraft Luna 16 landed on the moon and returned a small sample of lunar soil to Earth.
Prior to that, no nation had ever successfully landed a craft on the moon.
That was how the Soviet Union lost millions of dollars in trying to fix the damages already
done by the exploded N1 rocket.
So spacex don’t want to risk losing investor’s funds in a single launch attempt.
You should try to imagine what will be the fate of NASA if that be.
Spacex last rocket explosion happened on the 3rd of March 2021, when a test flight was
conducted on the SN10 starship rocket at Boca Chica launch facility, Texas.
The purpose of the test was to practically show the rocket's ability to perform a "landing
flip" maneuver, where it would turn itself around and land vertically on the launch pad.
Everything was going well, and the test looks successful, when the starship ascent to an
altitude of approximately 10 kilometers.
At this altitude, something drastic happened, the rocket's three Raptor engines shut down
as planned, and the rocket began its descent towards the landing pad.
As the rocket approached the landing pad, it successfully executed its flip maneuver,
but as it descended towards the ground, one of its engines, which would have reduced its
landing speed failed to ignite, causing it to land at an angle, flipped over, exploded
and got burnt to ashes.
The cause of the engine failure has not been officially revealed since then, but it is
believed to be caused by a methane leak in the engine.
The explosion caused damages to the launch pad and the surrounding area, but there were
no injuries reported.
Despite the failure of the landing, the company’s goal of performing complex flip maneuver with
the starship was a partial success, which will be executed during landing for missions
to the Moon and Mars.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk described the test as a "great advancement" for the company's
Starship program and stated that they would incorporate lessons learned from the SN10
test into future iterations of the rocket, and the upper stage starship will ultilize
this landing method while landing on the moon, because the chopsticks catcher will not be
soon built on the moon, during the first starship launch.
However, spacex starship engineers may think they have done a lot to correct all errors
the starship might face during launch, but they haven't tested them in flight yet.
If something unexpected happens, a structural failure could be inevitable.
All the starship’s systems have been tested a lot on the ground, but nothing beats a real
flight test.
Before the test Milestone Musk also said that a lot could go wrong.
In his words he said “I really want to stress that the chances of success are not very high
because I don't want to ruin it.
I'm tempted to say this because I'm feeling really hopeful, but I don't think that hope
is based in reality.
I feel like we have a two-thirds chance of success, but we only have a 50/50 chance.
if we loss the raptor engines, that would be something really bad.”
Musk confirms that the Starship Orbital Test Flight has a 50 percent chance of being successful
is probably based on a number of factors related to the project's complexity and technical
challenges.
First of all, the Starship is a big, complicated spaceship that is meant to take people and
cargo to places like the Moon and Mars.
As such, it uses a lot of cutting-edge technologies, such as reusable system component, cryogenic
fuels, and advanced life support systems, all of which pose big technical challenges.
Second, the Starship is still a work in progress, so there may be problems or issues that will
come up during the launch which would is not initially expected.
This is especially true for the Orbital Test Flight, which will be the first time the Starship
tries to get into orbit instead of just making short hops below orbit.
Third, SpaceX has a history of setting ambitious goals and deadlines for its projects, which
has not actually come true due to technical setbacks.
Musk has said that the company's schedules are often too optimistic, and he has told
his team to work as quickly and efficiently as possible while keeping safety and quality
as their top priorities.
Given these factors, it makes sense that Musk would be cautious about how likely it will
be for the starship test flight to be successful.
He has said that he is confident that the project can be done, but he is also very aware
of the technical challenges and risks.
By setting realistic goals for the test flight, he is acknowledging the difficulty of the
project and the possibility of problems that were not expected.
He is also showing his dedication to pushing the limits of space exploration.
Elon already knows that there is a fatal flaw on the way which the starship may face during
the flight, but he wants to avoid that by all means, because if explosion happens production
cost will be completely lost.
So, the starship will need to be tested as many times as possible, up to 10 hours on
steady steaming, before there will be hope for success on its way to orbit.
Do you think the starship will blow up during the first orbital flight?
Maybe this is one of the reasons why Elon Musk just cancelled Starship orbital launch,
click on the video to know the truth about this.