• Kairos boom

    From Snidely@snidely.too@gmail.com to sci.space.policy on Tue Mar 12 19:24:06 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    Kairos' Maiden Flight, Space One's launch from Kii Spaceport,
    (Northern) Japan, only lasted a few seconds. The video stream showed
    the clouds of smoke from the debris fire casting ominous shadows on the
    pad {ominous is my contribution).

    This rocket used 3 solid stages with a liquid-fueled kickstage. Solids
    avoid the difficulty of building an orbital-class turbopump, but space
    is still hard.

    /dps
    --
    "That's a good sort of hectic, innit?"

    " Very much so, and I'd recommend the haggis wontons."
    -njm
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  • From Snidely@snidely.too@gmail.com to sci.space.policy on Wed Mar 13 05:14:12 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    Snidely explained on 3/12/2024 :
    Kairos' Maiden Flight, Space One's launch from Kii Spaceport, (Northern) Japan,

    Not so far north, just south of Osaka. I was thinking up towards
    Sapporo, but that was a misunderstanding.

    only lasted a few seconds. The video stream showed the clouds of
    smoke from the debris fire casting ominous shadows on the pad {ominous is my contribution).

    NSF reports that the flight termination was used. The actual RUD was
    not visible on the WTV stream; the rocket lifted off and went off the
    first camera, which wasn't a tracking cam. The next view was from a
    camera showing the debris cloud rising up from behind a hill. The view
    went back to the first camera to show the fires on the ground, in the
    ravine leading to the sea.

    This rocket used 3 solid stages with a liquid-fueled kickstage. Solids avoid
    the difficulty of building an orbital-class turbopump, but space is still hard.


    /dps
    --
    And the Raiders and the Broncos have life now in the West. I thought
    they were both nearly dead if not quite really most sincerely dead. --
    Mike Salfino, fivethirtyeight.com
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  • From The Running Man@runningman@writeable.com to sci.space.policy on Wed Mar 13 16:05:40 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    On 12/03/2024 19:24 Snidely <snidely.too@gmail.com> wrote:
    Kairos' Maiden Flight, Space One's launch from Kii Spaceport,
    (Northern) Japan, only lasted a few seconds. The video stream showed
    the clouds of smoke from the debris fire casting ominous shadows on the
    pad {ominous is my contribution).

    This rocket used 3 solid stages with a liquid-fueled kickstage. Solids
    avoid the difficulty of building an orbital-class turbopump, but space
    is still hard.

    /dps

    --
    "That's a good sort of hectic, innit?"

    " Very much so, and I'd recommend the haggis wontons."
    -njm

    I think it was simply poorly executed. We've had similar failures which were traced to the hydrophilic nature of the solid fuel. This resulted in the fuel becoming brittle and a huge surface area for the fuel to burn resulting in an explosion.

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  • From om@om@iki.fi (Otto J. Makela) to sci.space.policy on Thu Mar 14 13:09:07 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    Snidely <snidely.too@gmail.com> wrote:

    NSF reports that the flight termination was used.

    Indeed:

    "The rocket terminated the flight after judging that the
    achievement of its mission would be difficult," company
    president Masakazu Toyoda said.
    Space One did not specify what triggered self-destruction
    after the first-stage engine ignited - or when the company would
    launch the next Kairos - only pledging an investigation into the
    explosion.
    The company said that the launch is highly automated,
    requiring only about a dozen ground staff, and that the rocket
    self-destructs when it detects errors in its flight path, speed
    or control system that could cause a crash that endangers people
    on the ground.
    -- https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/japans-space-one-counts-down-inaugural-kairos-rocket-launch-2024-03-12/
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  • From The Running Man@runningman@writeable.com to sci.space.policy on Thu Mar 14 14:51:12 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy


    On 14/03/2024 13:09 om@iki.fi (Otto J. Makela)
    wrote:
    Snidely <snidely.too@gmail.com> wrote:

    NSF reports that the flight termination was used.

    Indeed:

    "The rocket terminated the flight after judging that the
    achievement of its mission would be difficult," company
    president Masakazu Toyoda said.
    Space One did not specify what triggered self-destruction
    after the first-stage engine ignited - or when the company would
    launch the next Kairos - only pledging an investigation into the
    explosion.
    The company said that the launch is highly automated,
    requiring only about a dozen ground staff, and that the rocket
    self-destructs when it detects errors in its flight path, speed
    or control system that could cause a crash that endangers people
    on the ground.
    -- https://www.reuters.com/technology/space/japans-space-one-counts-down-inaugural-kairos-rocket-launch-2024-03-12/

    How can it know that only 5 seconds after launch? I mean, the avionics can steer the rocket, right?

    Could be a programming error in the FTS.

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  • From om@om@iki.fi (Otto J. Makela) to sci.space.policy on Thu Mar 14 18:38:51 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    The Running Man <runningman@writeable.com> wrote:

    How can it know that only 5 seconds after launch? I mean,
    the avionics can steer the rocket, right?

    Could be a programming error in the FTS.

    Could be. In a wider-view video I think you could see the rocket
    beginning to veer to the side even within those 5 seconds,
    which might indicate some kind of a systemic error.

    https://youtu.be/Fq0zDjQEIHE
    --
    /* * * Otto J. Makela <om@iki.fi> * * * * * * * * * */
    /* Phone: +358 40 765 5772, ICBM: N 60 10' E 24 55' */
    /* Mail: Mechelininkatu 26 B 27, FI-00100 Helsinki */
    /* * * Computers Rule 01001111 01001011 * * * * * * */
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  • From Snidely@snidely.too@gmail.com to sci.space.policy on Thu Mar 14 15:57:42 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    Otto J. Makela explained :
    The Running Man <runningman@writeable.com> wrote:

    How can it know that only 5 seconds after launch? I mean,
    the avionics can steer the rocket, right?

    Could be a programming error in the FTS.

    Could be. In a wider-view video I think you could see the rocket
    beginning to veer to the side even within those 5 seconds,
    which might indicate some kind of a systemic error.

    https://youtu.be/Fq0zDjQEIHE

    Also, 5 seconds is plenty of time for a chamber pressure issue. Moern
    FTS is more than just "off track".

    /dps
    --
    https://xkcd.com/2704
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  • From Snidely@snidely.too@gmail.com to sci.space.policy on Thu Mar 14 17:10:52 2024
    From Newsgroup: sci.space.policy

    Remember when Otto J. Makela bragged outrageously? That was Thursday:
    The Running Man <runningman@writeable.com> wrote:

    How can it know that only 5 seconds after launch? I mean,
    the avionics can steer the rocket, right?

    Could be a programming error in the FTS.

    Could be. In a wider-view video I think you could see the rocket
    beginning to veer to the side even within those 5 seconds,
    which might indicate some kind of a systemic error.

    https://youtu.be/Fq0zDjQEIHE

    Thanks for that link!

    -d
    --
    Who, me? And what lacuna?
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