| Bloody Musk.... on 08:32 - Aug 3 with 795 views | GeoffSentence |
Sooner or later one of these bits of debris falling back to Earth is going to hit a populous area and kill people.
We are quite lucky it has not already happened, but with rate that this stuff is going up there now it is bound to happen. |  |
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| Bloody Musk.... on 09:28 - Aug 3 with 722 views | StokieBlue |
| Bloody Musk.... on 08:32 - Aug 3 by GeoffSentence |
Sooner or later one of these bits of debris falling back to Earth is going to hit a populous area and kill people.
We are quite lucky it has not already happened, but with rate that this stuff is going up there now it is bound to happen. |
For some context, this was a small capsule which shouldn't happen again because all the SpaceX stuff now lands using a controlled re-entry and is then reused. They obviously should have controlled it better though.
The real problem with regards to this is China who keep lobbing up non-reusable rockets which boost into low orbit and then don't burn up on re-entry. Last week a 23 ton booster Chinese booster rocket underwent uncontrolled re-entry and the Chinese had absolutely no idea where it was going to land (it could even have been Beijing which was in the possible area although that area was huge).
The Americans and the Russians managed to get far more controlled re-entry in the 1980's, there is no excuse at all for China to be doing this except laziness.
"He said that of the six biggest uncontrolled re-entries of the space age, three were recent Chinese rockets.
“It really shows you that they stand out as different from what other countries are doing nowadays … we realised in the 70s that letting 20-30 tonne things [re-enter uncontrolled] was a bad idea."
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| Bloody Musk.... on 09:34 - Aug 3 with 706 views | Guthrum |
| Bloody Musk.... on 08:32 - Aug 3 by GeoffSentence |
Sooner or later one of these bits of debris falling back to Earth is going to hit a populous area and kill people.
We are quite lucky it has not already happened, but with rate that this stuff is going up there now it is bound to happen. |
Less likely because most re-entries of large objects are deliberately managed so that anything which does not burn up lands in remote areas of ocean. Populous areas tend to be concentrated in particular regions of the world and a responsible space agency wouldn't jettison anything in a position where it might fall in one of those.
One of the reasons this debris may have reached the ground is because the part (essentially a circular flange which fits on the back of the capsule to hold cargo) is light and quite "draggy", thus would have slowed down more quickly in the upper atmosphere, without generating the heat from long deceleration of a larger and heavier object. |  |
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| Bloody Musk.... on 09:40 - Aug 3 with 676 views | ronnyd |
Just stick it on E Bay, He'll probably get a reasonable amount for it. Of flog it back to Elon. |  | | |
| Bloody Musk.... on 09:42 - Aug 3 with 676 views | StokieBlue |
| Bloody Musk.... on 09:34 - Aug 3 by Guthrum |
Less likely because most re-entries of large objects are deliberately managed so that anything which does not burn up lands in remote areas of ocean. Populous areas tend to be concentrated in particular regions of the world and a responsible space agency wouldn't jettison anything in a position where it might fall in one of those.
One of the reasons this debris may have reached the ground is because the part (essentially a circular flange which fits on the back of the capsule to hold cargo) is light and quite "draggy", thus would have slowed down more quickly in the upper atmosphere, without generating the heat from long deceleration of a larger and heavier object. |
China are deliberately not managing their re-entries of large booster stages and are being heavily criticised by all the other space agencies.
It's ridiculous.
SB [Post edited 3 Aug 2022 9:56]
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| Bloody Musk.... on 10:01 - Aug 3 with 615 views | Guthrum |
| Bloody Musk.... on 09:42 - Aug 3 by StokieBlue |
China are deliberately not managing their re-entries of large booster stages and are being heavily criticised by all the other space agencies.
It's ridiculous.
SB [Post edited 3 Aug 2022 9:56]
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Indeed. Tho the biggest danger (from the inland launch sites) is to their own territory. | |
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| Bloody Musk.... on 10:06 - Aug 3 with 608 views | StokieBlue |
| Bloody Musk.... on 10:01 - Aug 3 by Guthrum |
Indeed. Tho the biggest danger (from the inland launch sites) is to their own territory. |
Not once it's actually achieved orbit, that's only the case if something goes wrong with the launch. Once it's up there they are taking their chances and outsourcing their risk to the rest of the world.
The one last week fell on Malaysia. Quite a large part of that possible impact zone isn't China, in fact most of it isn't China and with other recent ones it's not been China at all.
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| Bloody Musk.... on 10:20 - Aug 3 with 591 views | Guthrum |
| Bloody Musk.... on 10:06 - Aug 3 by StokieBlue |
Not once it's actually achieved orbit, that's only the case if something goes wrong with the launch. Once it's up there they are taking their chances and outsourcing their risk to the rest of the world.
The one last week fell on Malaysia. Quite a large part of that possible impact zone isn't China, in fact most of it isn't China and with other recent ones it's not been China at all.
SB |
That's the upper stage rather than the booster. Which should be a lot easier to control where it comes down, being - at least for a while - in a stable orbit. Tho it does require carrying up extra fuel and having relightable engines (or additional ones for the deorbit burn).
No excuse for it, really, from a reasonably advanced space agency. Everybody else does it, including SpaceX*.
* The item in the article being an inert piece of jettisoned debris, not a large chunk of hardware. | |
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| Bloody Musk.... on 10:31 - Aug 3 with 573 views | StokieBlue |
| Bloody Musk.... on 10:20 - Aug 3 by Guthrum |
That's the upper stage rather than the booster. Which should be a lot easier to control where it comes down, being - at least for a while - in a stable orbit. Tho it does require carrying up extra fuel and having relightable engines (or additional ones for the deorbit burn).
No excuse for it, really, from a reasonably advanced space agency. Everybody else does it, including SpaceX*.
* The item in the article being an inert piece of jettisoned debris, not a large chunk of hardware. |
The Long March 5B is a slightly weird design though in that the large first stage actually makes it to orbit
"The Long March 5B is a variant of China’s largest rocket. It consists of a core stage and four side boosters. Exceptionally, the first and largest stage of this rocket also acts as the upper stage, inserting the payload into orbit.
As the rocket’s YF-77 liquid hydrogen-liquid oxygen engines apparently cannot restart once in orbit, the large first stage deorbits due to atmospheric drag, or an uncontrolled reentry. The vast majority of rocket first stages do not reach orbital velocity and fall within a calculated, safe area downrange from launch."
As you say, no excuse for it really, this isn't cutting edge technology where there are lots of unknowns.
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| Bloody Musk.... on 10:44 - Aug 3 with 544 views | Guthrum |
| Bloody Musk.... on 10:31 - Aug 3 by StokieBlue |
The Long March 5B is a slightly weird design though in that the large first stage actually makes it to orbit
"The Long March 5B is a variant of China’s largest rocket. It consists of a core stage and four side boosters. Exceptionally, the first and largest stage of this rocket also acts as the upper stage, inserting the payload into orbit.
As the rocket’s YF-77 liquid hydrogen-liquid oxygen engines apparently cannot restart once in orbit, the large first stage deorbits due to atmospheric drag, or an uncontrolled reentry. The vast majority of rocket first stages do not reach orbital velocity and fall within a calculated, safe area downrange from launch."
As you say, no excuse for it really, this isn't cutting edge technology where there are lots of unknowns.
SB |
Suggests they're cutting corners on efficiency for the sake of simplicity and cheapness. An engine optimised for use at ground level will not work as well once the atmosphere becomes very thin (and vice-versa). Plus they are having to accelerate a lot of extra mass to orbital velocity. There are reasons why most people use multiple stages.
Having the ability to relight your orbital stage not only allows controlled re-entry, but also gives much more flexibility on launch parameters, orbital insertion, deployment of mutiple payloads (without them needing their own propulsion systems) and so on. | |
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| Bloody Musk.... on 13:37 - Aug 3 with 475 views | stonojnr |
| Bloody Musk.... on 09:28 - Aug 3 by StokieBlue |
For some context, this was a small capsule which shouldn't happen again because all the SpaceX stuff now lands using a controlled re-entry and is then reused. They obviously should have controlled it better though.
The real problem with regards to this is China who keep lobbing up non-reusable rockets which boost into low orbit and then don't burn up on re-entry. Last week a 23 ton booster Chinese booster rocket underwent uncontrolled re-entry and the Chinese had absolutely no idea where it was going to land (it could even have been Beijing which was in the possible area although that area was huge).
The Americans and the Russians managed to get far more controlled re-entry in the 1980's, there is no excuse at all for China to be doing this except laziness.
"He said that of the six biggest uncontrolled re-entries of the space age, three were recent Chinese rockets.
“It really shows you that they stand out as different from what other countries are doing nowadays … we realised in the 70s that letting 20-30 tonne things [re-enter uncontrolled] was a bad idea."
SB |
Not strictly true if this was the trunk from Dragon, that always separates before reentry to burn up in the atmosphere, that this didn't means it didn't get shoved into right deorbit trajectory, also evidenced by it should have taken 2months to deorbit and it took nearly 2 years if it was crew1 which is fixable on later flights of course but its one of those you get slightly wrong and you can't correct it.
The Chinese boosters are worse because they don't care where they land but they still have hypergolic fuels on board which leak and is very nasty stuff for living things | | | |
| Bloody Musk.... on 13:40 - Aug 3 with 466 views | XYZ |
| Bloody Musk.... on 08:32 - Aug 3 by GeoffSentence |
Sooner or later one of these bits of debris falling back to Earth is going to hit a populous area and kill people.
We are quite lucky it has not already happened, but with rate that this stuff is going up there now it is bound to happen. |
Free Chicken Licken! | | | |
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