Timeline for What happened to the SpaceX Starship SN11? Why did it crash?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
14 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 2, 2021 at 1:29 | comment | added | Loren Pechtel | @DavidHammen I don't understand your comment--I was saying it doesn't look like a situation where a human pushed the button but that it could be the rocket itself doing it. | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 13:31 | comment | added | Saiboogu | I will observe that I've heard people say that other people say that SpaceX people say it was FTS ... And I hear people say that they heard first hand from SpaceX people that it wasn't FTS. It's a small distinction, but in every instance the counter examples are more direct, less hearsay. | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 12:45 | comment | added | David Hammen | @PearsonArtPhoto I too have contacts within SpaceX, but I intentionally have not asked them a thing. Currently all we have is hearsay. I have not seen anything in the open media about key data recording equipment having been recovered. That recovery could shed light on the AFTS imbroglio. Suppose it does turn out that the explosion resulted from the AFTS unzipping the tanks. Even if that turns out to be the case, that almost certainly wouldn't be the root cause. SpaceX is looking for that root cause because that is what they need to fix. Until they find it, "loose lips sink ships". | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 12:18 | comment | added | PearsonArtPhoto♦ | Those rumors I haven't heard. Hmmm, guess I need to dig more in to that rabbit hole... | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 12:17 | comment | added | David Hammen | Others claim to have heard from good sources within SpaceX that it was the AFTS, @PearsonArtPhoto. And that gets to the heart of the problem raised by uhoh in his very first comment under the question: "I have heard that..." and "I have read that..." and "People say that..." There's too much of that going on right now. The right answer, at least for now, is the we (the general public) do not know what caused the incident, and I suspect that "we do not know" is currently the correct answer even within SpaceX. | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 11:43 | comment | added | PearsonArtPhoto♦ | I have it on good authority that it wasn't the FTS system. I've heard from a good source that at least 5 SpaceX employees have confirmed it. What exactly what the problem is tricky... | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 9:41 | comment | added | David Hammen | @JörgWMittag The last callout shortly before the explosion was that the vehicle's altitude was 1 km. There was no callout that the AFTS had been safed, so termination via the AFTS cannot be ruled out. It of course also cannot also be ruled in; it's far too early in the investigative phase of a midair explosion to rule anything in. As I noted in my previous comment, patience is a virtue. | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 9:32 | comment | added | David Hammen | @PearsonArtPhoto There is a lot of scuttlebutt that it was the AFTS. But this is just scuttlebutt for now. Patience is a virtue; these investigations can take weeks, sometimes months, to complete. | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 9:29 | comment | added | David Hammen | @LorenPechtel SpaceX uses an automated flight termination system. The AFTS can punch the big red button all by itself; intervention by a range safety officer is not required. | |
| Apr 1, 2021 at 1:31 | comment | added | Loren Pechtel | I will agree that there was no reason anybody would have sent a destruct command. However, off the top of my head I can come up with two rockets that suicided because of catastrophic failure. | |
| Mar 31, 2021 at 17:19 | comment | added | Jörg W Mittag | I can't imagine it being the FTS either. It was directly over the landing pad, smack-dab in the middle of the exclusion zone, and only a couple 100m high. There was no reason to terminate it, it wasn't going anywhere it wasn't supposed to. | |
| Mar 31, 2021 at 15:52 | comment | added | PearsonArtPhoto♦ | It wasn't the FTS. Of that I am quite sure. A FTS failure should explode less, and is highly unlikely to happen just off the ground... | |
| Mar 31, 2021 at 14:59 | history | edited | PearsonArtPhoto♦ | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Typos.
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| Mar 30, 2021 at 20:46 | history | answered | David Hammen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |