Lotta headlines today about the SpaceX Starship blowing up, and that the launch wasn’t successful. Bullshit. Anything that got off the launch pad was successful, and I’m sure this test launch gave SpaceX engineers a wealth of data to analyze and do it better next time. the people who write those headlines either don’t understand the meaning of “test” or don’t care. People forget that SpaceX blew up a lot of Falcon 9s before evolving it into a very reliable launch vehicle.
It *is* interesting to speculate on why stage 2 didn’t separate as planned. Mechanical failure? Software or firmware glitch? We’ll find out. But this launch included a full Super Heavy burn, transition through MaxQ, and a lot of other milestones. Can’t wait for the next try.
I did something yesterday I seldom do – I gave up on a book. Adrian Tchaichovski’s Cage of Souls. Just too damn depressing and too slow paced. I liked his Children of Time series, but not this one. Can’t win ’em all, I guess.
Also, first Faux News and now Lindell has to put his money where his mouth is. I sure hope the courts make this asshat pay up. $5M will hurt a bit.
Finally, and sadly, we have a fourth incident just this week of innocent folks being shot by someone just for crossing their property line. A little girl and her parents were shot by a neighbor upset that a basketball rolled onto his lawn. A basketball! It’s insane – what has to happen before people understand that many, many folks who have guns don’t have the maturity/ability/training/confidence/education to own one? I’m not against gun ownership, but I *am* against gun ownership by just any idiot. You should have to earn the right, to prove that you are trained, capable and responsible. Until that happens, we’ll keep getting this result.