SpaceX to Fly Passengers On Private Trip

BuiltFromTrash said:

Not sure where you get your information. Maybe you should do some research before you post.
These are the stat for 2016: https://www.spacelaunchreport.com/log2016.html#rate
Note that some vehicles may not have comparable sample size and as such, comparing them may skew findings.
If someone has better a better source, please post it.

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Falcon 9 since it's debut in 2010 has had 28 successes out of 30 for a success rate of 93 percent. This is lower than Soyuz and the Space Shuttle. Space-X will need about 70 more perfect flights in a row to reach a success rate of 98 percent, a formidable task, indeed.

As much as I would love to go to space, and even considering how much I would be willing to sacrifice and risk for the opportunity, I would not want to fly on any untested or unproven system. So, you would not find me on the first test flight of the SLS/Orion, and you also would not find me on the first test flight of a Falcon Heavy/Dragon. They would need to be tested first.

It's sort of silly to try to compare the reliability of two systems, neither of which has ever flown. :eyeroll:

I think the difference between the two ideas for the "moon shot" is that the SpaceX idea is to fly people on a system in which the booster will have at least been flown on unmanned missions by that point, and the capsule will have flown on manned missions. Whereas the NASA idea is to basically skip the test mission planned for 2018 and speed up the manned mission planned for 2021 to 2019 and do it on an untested system. The SpaceX plan seems more prudent to me, regardless of what you think about the reliability of their respective (untested at this point) systems.

NASA is looking into the idea because they were asked to look into it. It sounds like they were asked to research the idea by an official in the new administration's transition 'landing team". And it also sounds like they may have been motivated because SpaceX had already broached the subject of its own moon mission flight with NASA. Maybe the official who asked for the study did not want NASA to be upstaged by SpaceX and at least wanted to explore the idea of "beating" SpaceX in this weird version of the "space race". My guess is that NASA will probably decide against the idea, but if they do go for it, I'm sure they will have prudently considered all of the risks and benefits.

And who knows if SapceX will actually fly its own moon mission as described in the announcement. There are all kinds of things that could delay or cancel the idea, including problems with Falcon Heavy and Dragon 2, regulatory issues, or problems with the customers and commercial viability of the project. We will have to wait and see.

ThirstyBarbarian said:

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NASA is looking into the idea because they were asked to look into it. It sounds like they were asked to research the idea by an official in the new administration's transition 'landing team". And it also sounds like they may have been motivated because SpaceX had already broached the subject of its own moon mission flight with NASA. Maybe the official who asked for the study did not want NASA to be upstaged by SpaceX and at least wanted to explore the idea of "beating" SpaceX in this weird version of the "space race". My guess is that NASA will probably decide against the idea, but if they do go for it, I'm sure they will have prudently considered all of the risks and benefits.

And who knows if SpaceX will actually fly its own moon mission as described in the announcement. There are all kinds of things that could delay or cancel the idea, including problems with Falcon Heavy and Dragon 2, regulatory issues, or problems with the customers and commercial viability of the project. We will have to wait and see.

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Well said.

Either way, I know we're all looking forward to returning to the Moon. I've been wondering that since the last line in the movie Apollo 13: "I look up at the moon and wonder, when will we be going back, and who will that be? "

I like Thirsty's viewpoints, too. Why not have two programs looking at this possibility, especially if it captures the public's attention on manned spaceflight. Anyone who thinks that space flights either manned or unmanned are not based sometimes on national or international politics is not paying attention. It is amazing how many unmanned US space probes have arrived at planets on the 4th of July. Even the first Sputnik was launched at about the time of the anniversary of the Russian Revolution.

One thing to keep in mind about the Space-X circum-lunar flight, even though it does not require taxpayer's dollars, is that it is based on the whim of the rich. Such a deep-space program is not sustainable. Even Elon Musk in announcing the Space-X circum-lunar flight idea gave his appreciation for all of NASA's support. The very engines in the Falcon 9 have their origins in a NASA design that was shared with Space-X. To survive a 25,000 mph re-entry requires some finesse in keeping g-loads at a tolerable level for returning astronauts without skipping off the atmosphere and going into deep space. No one else but NASA has this real experience and expertise.

BuiltFromTrash said:

Not sure where you get your information. Maybe you should do some research before you post.
These are the stat for 2016: https://www.spacelaunchreport.com/log2016.html#rate
Note that some vehicles may not have comparable sample size and as such, comparing them may skew findings.
If someone has better a better source, please post it.

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A couple of things about the data set you posted don't make sense. Right off the top and relevant to the current discussion, they say that Falcon 9 v1.2 is 8 for 8 successes, discounting the pad explosion late last year and the in-flight second stage explosion earlier. I'm pretty sure that was v1.2, but I could be wrong about that. When you look at the other data, there are some weird things, too. For example, the CZ-2D is listed as being 31/32, but also shows a 100% success rate. Something is wrong there.

That doesn't get away from the fact that there's a 1%-5% chance of any given rocket launch going bad, which is exactly why I'm not planning on riding one any time soon.

boatgeek said:

That doesn't get away from the fact that there's a 1%-5% chance of any given rocket launch going bad, which is exactly why I'm not planning on riding one any time soon.

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Well, yeah. There is alway a percentage of an given rocket launch going bad.

Those percentages are a lot higher for the first ones. And higher still for the riskier ones. And most risky when outside pressure meddles with engineering decisions.

Me, if given the chance to fly on the 10h crewed Dragon-2 flight, I'd take it (moon..... would depend). If Orion was launched on some other proven man-rated booster, I'd also go for that on the 10th crewed flight of the spacecraft. I'd want to see SLS work 20 times before I flew on it, and as I said I extremely doubt it would fly 20 times as that would mean at least 40 years from now at one flight every 2 or 3 years (when SLS will almost certainly be long canceled by then, may not fly 10 times).

And I absolutely would have flown on the Space Shuttle.

ThirstyBarbarian said:

Even if your co-passenger were to be Kate Upton, after a whole week, you might get tired of her pooping in a ziplock bag right next to you.

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You forgot to mention the *smell*. Not like you could open up a window or light a match...

"Damn girl, no more dehydrated peas and, carrots for you...How about some powdered eggs?"

Maybe not a good choice either-

It looks doubtful that the paying passengers will get to fly around the moon in 2018, or even 2019. I wonder how long before we're told who they are?


https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/7/16983040/spacex-falcon-heavy-rocket-launch-schedule-spaceflight

SpaceX plans to fly humans in the Dragon spacecraft on top of Falcon 9, and the company had initially planned to do the same with the Falcon Heavy. One of the missions SpaceX is planning would use the Falcon Heavy to send two paying tourists around the Moon later this year. And the company obviously had its sights set on using the Falcon Heavy to take astronauts on similar journeys.

But development of the BFR is coming along at such a clip that Musk believes the company will move these potential missions to the larger rocket...

...But if SpaceX misses these ambitious targets for the BFR, Musk said, the company could simply pivot back to flying humans on the Falcon Heavy. “We’ll see how the BFR development goes,” Musk said. “If that ends up taking longer than expected, then we will return to the idea of sending a Crew Dragon on Falcon Heavy around the Moon, and potentially doing other things with crew on Falcon Heavy.”

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(Here's where George rants, again, about Elon's estimates being way off)

Help me out here. My understanding is that you need five successful unmanned flights of a given rocket in the same configuration to make it man-rated. FH will fly two to four times a year depending on customer interest. BFR is "scheduled" for the first orbital flight in 3-4 years. How the heck does moving the astronaut flight to BFR speed up the timeline? Sure, they're going to tweak FH some over the next few years, so they wouldn't be able to start the 5-flight clock for a while. But it just doesn't make sense to me that BFR would be faster.

I also continue to not get why SpaceX thinks that they will retire F9 and transfer all of those launches to BFR when they don't appear to have a lot of customers for FH. Hit me with a clue stick if I deserve it.

boatgeek said:

How the heck does moving the astronaut flight to BFR speed up the timeline?

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The article made it sound like they might skip the man rating process of the FH completely and save time that way. Get to the BFR quicker than if they stuck with the FH man rated schedule.