Sped-up version
Short enough to watch multiple times, full-screen,
paying attention to different things each time
Onboard view from Falcon 9’s flight to space and back during smallsat rideshare mission pic.twitter.com/V5PyKxTlWD
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) January 5, 2023
This view is from near the top of Stg-1 looking aft.
Notice how the engine plume gets wider as it gets higher due to the drop in the surrounding air pressure. The plume’s colors also change.
If the cold-gas attitude-control thrusters don’t seem to synch-up with the pitch/yaw motion, remember that the more obvious of the thrusters are high on the body, above the center of gravity.
Also notice that after the re-entry burn, when the atmosphere gets dense enough, the trusters go quiet; and the grid fins take the helm. Gimballing engines do the steering when they’re firing.
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• Previously
Here’s a good, detailed description of what’s goin’ on
Thinking about the forces involved and control response of that system boggles my mind.
The SpaceX ‘kids’ must be bouncing off the walls with pride at their accomplishments, while Bezos and NASA are grinding their teeth or jumping off bridges because their progress and success look puny in comparison.
Yeah, it’s truly awesome.
They’ve paid their dues, and after 193 launches, they now have lots and lots of real-world data to validate their predictive, design, and operational models, adjust their fudge factors, and reduce risk. Practice makes perfect. It’s a terrific advantage over newbies and singletons.
Got to thinking about it, and say what you will about Elon Musk, but he turned the launch biz on its head with his reusable rockets.
‘Pay for the gas & launch team, and we’ll throw in the rocket for (almost) free!’
Apparently he doesn’t just Tweet all day.
Once spent over a week steaming to Port Canaveral & searching for some junk NASA lost off the coast with our (at the time, top secret) SQQ14 sonar running a grid until we found it. 69/70? They made us back off over the horizon to pull it up. We were like, dude we saw it on the bottom. Pretty amazing tech back then when two guys with joysticks in front of a screen in CIC could literally determine the make of a car on the bottom with sonar.
I won’t go into the General’s water tower or the all-grades tiki club at Port Canaveral. Wildest military installation I ever visited.
https://www.upi.com/Science_News/2023/01/06/retired-nasa-satellite-expected-fall-earth-sunday/1691673058877/
the old guys did ok, too