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nextspaceflight.com
This website is incredibly useful, providing a list of most upcoming launches with links to livestream and information as well as keeping a list of past launches (along with some additional things like Starship info and testing dates)
Additionally;
spaceflightnow.com/launch-schedule
24
Gemini 2 (unmanned) was filmed for 90 seconds (second link) by an F-4
21
The maximum percentage wasted to noise is approximately 1%.
The acoustic efficiency, defined as the ratio of the sound power to
the rocket exhaust's mechanical power, for the majority of these data
range between 0.2 and 1 percent...with 0.5% as the most probable value.
NASA SP-8072 ACOUSTIC LOADS GENERATED BY THE PROPULSION SYSTEM
Using the equation for ...
16
The Space Shuttle SRBs had cameras, and after sep a falling SRB can clearly be seen falling with its twin. The way they fall in unison is amazing, note the parallel orientations for most of the fall.
10
or maybe just a high-altitude jet
Some of the later shuttle launches were filmed from one of the NASA WB-57 aircraft.
(personal photo)
The nose-mounted camera package didn't produce terrific results IMHO.
In addition I did find video of one rocket taken from another. It's not a film of the launch so maybe doesn't qualify ...
10
To my knowledge, ashes going to space fall under one of two categories.
They are attached to the upper stage as some kind of ballast.
They are connected to satellites that serve some other purpose.
So there is no specifically free-floating ashes in space. The vast majority of them return when the upper stage burns up. Most upper stages are either ...
10
Everyday Astronaut also has a great page for upcoming launches:
https://everydayastronaut.com/prelaunch-previews/
9
If you want the information in a way more dense table format, you can also check out nextrocket.space.
9
2020 in spaceflight on Wikipedia
You have to scroll down for suborbital flights.
7
It is not uncommon to film rocket launches from the rocket
Probably the most famous rocket tv footage, the Saturn Inner ring.
7
SRBs tend to be used for one of two types of purposes:
The rocket core is the same, but sometimes needs a bit of extra performance (Atlas, Vulcan)
The rocket core is hydrogen, and doesn't have enough thrust to get off the ground.
For the first one, a solid rocket is preferable as the rockets need to be cheap and small, and solid rockets are much easier, ...
6
You can also check https://www.rocketlaunch.live - It also lists the last few recent launches.
6
Hayabusa-2 landed on and then took of from the asteroid, so "unprepared surface".
Also the ascent stages of the Apollo Lunar Module were launched from the Moon back to orbit but they used the descent stage as a launchpad.
6
Of the the 0.2% to 1% of energy that is generated as sound, most of the sound is generated well after the exhaust gases have fulfilled their purpose of thrust:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jet_noise
As a crude analogy, imagine being on roller skates, then taking a bowling ball and throwing it. You will roll backwards on the skates. This is thrust.
Next, ...
6
I haven't seen acceleration-vs-time curves published by NASA.
The SLS Mission Planners Guide has a table of maximum expected acceleration. Looks like it is predicted to max out at 4.1 g.
6
Liquid hydrogen makes a poor first stage fuel. First stages operate with the vehicle full of propellant and lifting itself directly against gravity, and need thrust more than specific impulse. That means a high mass flow rate, and liquid hydrogen's lower density makes it more difficult to pump enough of it through the engine. Solid rockets are from the high ...
5
The Soyuz rockets, and all R-7 derivative rockets, separate their four liquid booster rockets in unison. Sometime in the past decade, the video feeds of cameras on the core Block A stage have been available showing this stage seperaton and the four boosters falling away from the core stages.
5
Clyde Tombaugh is in the Kuiper belt but Eugene Shoemaker now orbits the Earth.
4
This table shows that for the 494 launch countdowns between October 1988 and August 2000 at the Eastern Test Range, there was a 10% chance of a weather related delay and an 18% chance of a weather related scrub.
Source: Weather Support to the Space Shuttle: An Historical Perspective
3
On the west coast, there's someone who maintains a mailing list called Launch-Alert announcing upcoming launches from Vandenberg AFB (and occasionally other things of interest like astronomical events).
2
I believe the winner in this department is going to be the Sprint missile. While it was not intended to go into space it would be heading up at more than Mach 10, it would reach space if nothing happened to it first. Since it was designed to reach 30km I would think most of them wouldn't burn through the remaining ablator (yes, it had a heat shield for ...
2
I think the closest to what you want is Start-1.
Start-1 is a modified RT-2PM Topol ICBM equipped with extra stage to put the payload in orbit (Topol itself is suborbital). So besides the civilian application and orbital capacity it retains most of its ICBM features.
It's not exactly 'just a flat surface' - it's an all-terain vehicle. All prerequisites for ...
2
No rocket has done except for those launched from airplanes, which take off from a flat runway. The reason are that the following would have to be true.
The upper stage to such a rocket would have to be either solidly fueled, have long term liquid storage, or be fueled from the lower stage(s).
The rocket would need to be small. A large rocket has needs for ...
2
“Are we there yet?” (45th Space Wing's goal of being able to support 48 launches per year from Cape Canaveral)
We won't know for certain this year about the 48 launches, but since they are "on pace for 39" this year and could support three launches in three days, it seems likely that this is imminent.
Space News' 45th Space Wing to attempt three ...
2
I find the Google Calendar "Worldwide Space Launches" very useful as it integrates with my existing calendars and notifications: https://calendar.google.com/calendar/embed?src=msacpn523mpjgq0jlooh41eme4%40group.calendar.google.com
1
If you want super crisp, straight up launch schedule with links for more info and livestream, I might as well point you to the beautiful cards on my website - Upcoming Launches
I built it using Launch Library API which is really accurate. It's a WebApp, so just add it to your home screen and launch with a tap of a button whenever you want to know about the ...
1
In BBC's four episode documentary "The Space Race" we see in the first episode how the Soviet Union launches the R1 (a copy of the German V2) and the R2 (which already has a stage that's separated) from a flat grass surface. The documentary is based on facts only, so it really must have been like this. The R1 and R2 could launch from a grass plain.
...
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