I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that this isn't trolling (though I strongly suspect it is). The footage is real. The channel is "fake" in that it's just re-streaming NASA's own feed.

https://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/ESRS/HDEV/

The launch was scrubbed last night. Next window is late Wednesday (early Thursday) at 12:34am ET.

This was tonight's view (we think) of the launch from a pirate cute in Cozumel... [emoji1787] [emoji1787] [emoji1787] [emoji1787] https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...cea1920dc5.jpg

Back on tonight!

T-5 minutes

To be clear: The asteroid is not going to hit us.

There was a while there when it seemed like it could. Suffice to say those were heady days in the asteroid-tracking community. But as of March 2021, NASA has confirmed that there is absolutely zero chance the space rock known as 99942 Apophis will strike this planet for at least 100 years. So, phew. Cross that particular doomsday scenario off the list.

What remains true, however, is that on Friday, April 13, 2029, an asteroid wider than three football fields will pass closer to Earth than anything its size has come in recorded history.

An asteroid strike is a disaster; an asteroid flyby, an opportunity. And Apophis offers one of the best chances science has ever had to learn how the Earth came to be — and how we might one day prevent its destruction.

In the movies, incoming asteroids appear without warning from the depths of space and speed directly toward us until missiles or Bruce Willis heroically destroy them.

In real life, asteroids orbit the sun on elliptical paths. They are often spotted years, if not decades, before a potential collision — which is not great for dramatic tension but better for planetary survival.

Apophis was discovered in 2004. After calculating its potential orbits, astronomers were startled to realize it had a 3% chance of hitting Earth in 2029. In a nod to its horrifying potential, they named it Apophis, after an Egyptian god of chaos.

"We were shocked," said Paul Chodas, who manages NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge. "That is very serious and, actually, a very unexpected and rare event."

Astronomers use a color-coded warning system called the Torino scale to gauge the degree of danger an asteroid or comet presents to Earth in the next 100 years. Since the scale's adopted in 1999, none of the roughly 30,000 near-Earth objects known to exist in the solar system had ranked higher than 1 on the zero-to-10 scale.

Apophis was a 4.

The longer astronomers track an asteroid, the more clearly defined its orbit becomes. Within a few months, scientists were able to rule out the possibility of a 2029 strike. Within a few years, they were able to dismiss the even smaller chance of a hit in 2036.

And in 2021, radar observations confirmed that Apophis will not strike when it passes us in 2068, leaving Earth in the clear for at least a century.

With humanity's safety assured — from this threat, at least — the coast was clear to geek out on some asteroid science.

"We've never seen something that large get that close," said Lance Benner, a principal scientist at JPL.

"Close," in the space world, is a relative term. At its nearest, Apophis will pass roughly 19,000 miles (31,000 kilometers) above Earth's surface. That's about one-tenth the distance to the moon.

No one on the ground will be tempted to duck, and it will not appear as a fireball swooshing across the heavens.

On the big night, Apophis will be visible with the naked eye from parts of Europe and Africa. (In Los Angeles, experienced stargazers might be able to spot it with binoculars around 3:30 a.m. on April 13.)

The asteroid close encounter presents "an unprecedented opportunity to study its physical properties and to help us learn things that we've never been able to learn before," Benner said.

An approach this close from an asteroid this big occurs at most every few thousand years, said Davide Farnocchia, a navigation engineer at JPL.

"It's something that almost never happens, and yet we get to witness it in our lifetime," Farnocchia said. "We usually send spacecraft out there to visit asteroids and find out about them. In this case, it's nature doing the flyby for us."

From the ground, Apophis will resemble a star traversing the night sky, as bright as the constellation Cassiopeia and slower than a satellite. Though it may appear far away for those of us down here, it will in fact be near enough for NASA to reach out and touch it.

OSIRIS-REx, a spacecraft currently ferrying home samples from the surface of an asteroid called Bennu, will rendezvous with Apophis in 2029. Shortly after April 13, the craft — by then renamed OSIRIS-APophis EXplorer, or OSIRIS-APEX — will steer toward the asteroid until it is drawn into its orbit, eventually getting close enough to collect a sample from its surface.

Apophis is shaped like a peanut shell, a form astronomers call a "contact binary." The hunk of nickel, iron and silicate is a relic from the earliest days of the solar system, a byproduct of the massive cloud of gas and dust that formed 4.6 billion years ago and eventually led to us.

"These asteroids are primordial samples," Chodas said. "Learning about the composition will help us understand the history of the solar system and where these things came from."

Given the proximity, researchers will also be able to study Apophis with ground-based tools that have never been deployed for an object this size.

On Dec. 27, researchers at the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) in Gakona, Alaska, sent a low-frequency radio signal to an asteroid called 2010 XC15. It was part of a test to see if radio waves could penetrate an asteroid and send back data on its interior structure, said Mark Haynes, the JPL radar systems engineer who led the project.

Knowing an asteroid's internal mass distribution would be extremely helpful if we needed to knock it out of our way.

Hundreds of space rocks hit Earth every year, and most are harmless. A big one, though, can wreak havoc far beyond its initial impact site.

The massive Chicxulub asteroid that 66 million years ago slammed into what is now the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico released an estimated 420 zettajoules of energy. (For context, the world's collective electricity output in 2021 was about 0.5 zettajoules.)

The resulting heat pulse vaporized rock and sparked wildfires across much of the planet, followed by a yearslong impact winter as a choking cloud of particulate matter blocked out the sun. By the time it was over, 75% of species were gone for good, including all non-avian dinosaurs.

The Chicxulub asteroid measured 7 miles across, the same as the city of Paris. Apophis is as long as the Eiffel Tower. A collision with an object that size would be less catastrophic but could still cause serious damage.

NASA is working on a plan to deal with that. Last year, its Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, spacecraft deliberately crashed into a rock 7 million miles away to see whether humans could change the trajectory of a celestial object. (Good news: We can.)

If we ever did have to deflect an incoming asteroid, that's how we'd do it: not with a grand, Death Star-style explosion but with a speedy projectile strong enough to knock it ever-so-slightly off course.

"That mission was spectacularly successful and showed that that technique works," Benner said. "Don't send Bruce Willis and a bunch of oil drillers up there to blast it to smithereens."

T-9:00

SpaceX is targeting Thursday, March 30 at 7:29 a.m. PT (14:29 UTC) for a Falcon 9 launch of the Space Development Agency’s Tranche 0 mission to low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 4E (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. If needed, a backup opportunity is available Friday, March 31 at the same time.

The first stage booster supporting this mission previously launched one Starlink mission. Following stage separation, the first stage will land on Landing Zone 4 (LZ-4) at Vandenberg Space Force Base.

The space vehicles launched during this mission will serve a part of SDA’s Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture, a new layered network of satellites in low-Earth orbit and supporting elements that will provide global military communication and missile warning, indication, and tracking capabilities.

A live webcast of this mission will begin about 15 minutes prior to liftoff.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fuiBsre2m64" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>

I'm lucky and can see Vandenberg night launches from my back yard. I can see the flame from the rocket as it first appears over the hills to the NW, and then the huge plume depending on atmospheric conditions. Pretty cool stuff.

itshappening.gif

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Targeting as soon as Monday, April 17 for the first flight test of a fully integrated Starship and Super Heavy rocket from Starbase in Texas → <a href="https://t.co/bJFjLCiTbK">https://t.co/bJFjLCiTbK</a> <a href="https://t.co/Ry25Uuvknh">pic.twitter.com/Ry25Uuvknh</a></p>&mdash; SpaceX (@SpaceX) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1646996041978507264?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 14, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">SpaceX says the Starship launch window will run from 7am to 9:30am local time (1200-1430 UTC) on Monday. Here is the keep-out zone for the launch. <a href="https://t.co/FWEJh6urz7">pic.twitter.com/FWEJh6urz7</a></p>&mdash; Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) <a href="https://twitter.com/SciGuySpace/status/1647001625071067136?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 14, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Starship team is go for prop load. Now targeting 8:20 a.m. CT→ <a href="https://t.co/bJFjLCiTbK">https://t.co/bJFjLCiTbK</a> <a href="https://t.co/8oRkmzwRRf">pic.twitter.com/8oRkmzwRRf</a></p>— SpaceX (@SpaceX) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1647927958273941505?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 17, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Scrub

Abort.

Hopefully, they can try again in 49 hours.

Next try is Thursday.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Teams are working towards Thursday, April 20 for the first flight test of a fully integrated Starship and Super Heavy rocket → <a href="https://t.co/bG5tsCUanp">https://t.co/bG5tsCUanp</a> <a href="https://t.co/umcqhJCGai">pic.twitter.com/umcqhJCGai</a></p>&mdash; SpaceX (@SpaceX) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1648092752893313024?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 17, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

I've been absolutely amazed at the images Webb has been sending back. Just incredible.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">SpaceX is moving forward with a Starship launch attempt tomorrow: <a href="https://t.co/WZpanM6eBf">pic.twitter.com/WZpanM6eBf</a></p>&mdash; Michael Sheetz (@thesheetztweetz) <a href="https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz/status/1648797393406803968?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 19, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

May hear a loud noise, eh?

LMAO

T-10:00 or so, maybe

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-1wcilQ58hI" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>

No whammies, no whammies...

Dude honestly excited as shit for this....

This could change the land scape of Space flight for Human race going forward. The sheer payload starship will be able to deliver to space will be game changing.

This ship will allow for us to actually get to Mars with enough supplies (plus drone ships) to actually get something done when we get there

Looks like a go. Woot.. Fingers crossed..

Elon Musk is a real life version of Tony Stark

Soooooooooooooooooooooo cool!!!

Shit! Hold..

Damn a hold

Let's do this!

Holy shit!

Max Q

WOW

Fly lady, fly

Oh no

Much of the rest of the space industry just threw up in their mouth a little.

rohroh

RUD!

That's a RUD!!!

Welp, she went boom... All good, lots learned.

Wish they could have gotten to second stage start, but that was still a hell of a show. Hopefully the test cycles can start to accelerate!

Was it planned to not light all the engines on SH?

It cleared the pad......... Success.....

Don't think so. The fact that they had a graphic planned for it tells me that losing a few wasn't unexpected though.

Everything past clearing the pad was considered icing on the cake

She was a beauty

I am shocked it wasn't a scrub on just the 2nd attempt.

Yeah that was new. Not on F9 launches. Did you see what apogee was? Last I saw was 20km.

Elon-talk but getting past Max Q was a great result.

Looks like 38km.

true but the fact all parts were going to hard land instead of trying to recover I think implies they just wanted to get past max g

this image tho was super cool

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FuKW1QRa...jpg&name=small

Sure, no question they would have wanted more. My initial hunch, though, is that it was mainly an issue with the separation system. Hopefully they at least got enough data to know what they need to troubleshoot.

Just so freaking cool to see something that big get off the ground

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Congrats <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@SpaceX</a> team on an exciting test launch of Starship!<br><br>Learned a lot for next test launch in a few months. <a href="https://t.co/gswdFut1dK">pic.twitter.com/gswdFut1dK</a></p>&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1649050306943266819?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

This is hilarious but also suggests how challenging the ground support systems are going to be for this thing. It's hard to imagine that there's not any ground-level damage even though the liftoff was completely nominal.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">VR Cam caught some spectacular footage as <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SuperHeavy?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SuperHeavy</a> rocked <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SpaceX?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SpaceX</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Starbase?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Starbase</a> this morning. I am floored at the amount of debris that was ejected. Waiting on Rover 2 damage assessment. Congratulations <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@elonmusk</a> on pulling this historical launch! <a href="https://t.co/6WKEXFqCGN">pic.twitter.com/6WKEXFqCGN</a></p>&mdash; LabPadre (@LabPadre) <a href="https://twitter.com/LabPadre/status/1649053476276797440?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Yikes. I hope Starbase didn't get too damaged. Looks like that vehicle took a good beating.

Yeah, I feel for whoever's van that is. Looks like the back end got completely crushed.

I bet the owner is more concerned with the equipment on top than the 20 year old minivan it's mounted on.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Crater McCrater face underneath OLM . Holy cow! <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SpaceX?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SpaceX</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Starbase?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Starbase</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Starship?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Starship</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Superheavy?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Superheavy</a> <a href="https://t.co/mgjefc3MNe">pic.twitter.com/mgjefc3MNe</a></p>&mdash; LabPadre (@LabPadre) <a href="https://twitter.com/LabPadre/status/1649062784167030785?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

That's nuts.

Some cool shots here:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/uouujjgkR3A?start=28900" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Unless it's a weird illusion, the ship really "leaned" away from the tower on launch.

Man. That's a lot of carnage.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Here&#39;s a look at the debris-strewn launch pad at SpaceX&#39;s Starbase facility in Texas following this morning&#39;s Starship test flight.<br><br>The launch of the world&#39;s largest rocket also left a large crater in the concrete under the launch mount.<br><br>��: <a href="https://twitter.com/LabPadre?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@LabPadre</a> <a href="https://t.co/4Qlst35wgT">https://t.co/4Qlst35wgT</a> <a href="https://t.co/rIS3LVkPTY">pic.twitter.com/rIS3LVkPTY</a></p>&mdash; Spaceflight Now (@SpaceflightNow) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceflightNow/status/1649090292836884480?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

It certainly looks that way. I wonder if that was due to the crater that it created underneath the launchpad.

I also wonder if that damage has anything to do with the 6 rocket engines that were not active. That is nearly 20% of the power they were expecting to use.

We are going to need a bigger launch pad

At a minimum, they need a heavily-reinforced flame trench.

Yeah, I wonder if it was intentional though just to make sure the tower didn't get damaged.

0:34

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">My Autotrack software captures the moment that Starship lost control. Excitement was very much guaranteed. Great first attempt by the SpaceX team!<br><br>Tune in to hear our live reaction! <a href="https://twitter.com/NASASpaceflight?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@NASASpaceflight</a> <a href="https://t.co/uutBwWSABz">https://t.co/uutBwWSABz</a> <a href="https://t.co/in201JaOiU">pic.twitter.com/in201JaOiU</a></p>&mdash; Michael Baylor (@nextspaceflight) <a href="https://twitter.com/nextspaceflight/status/1649052544755470338?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Liftoff from Starbase <a href="https://t.co/rgpc2XO7Z9">pic.twitter.com/rgpc2XO7Z9</a></p>&mdash; SpaceX (@SpaceX) <a href="https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/1649097087248891904?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Crazy shot. It looks like it came from the spot where one of the burned-out engines was located, but that's by no means a confirmation that it was an engine failure.

It definitely seems like engine reliability is a bit of a problem for now. It could just be debris getting kicked up at launch, but one way or another, I don't think losing all that thrust is ideal.

So, it was supposed to explode?

Sort of. The flight termination system worked perfectly.

Okay. Seems like a huge waste of materials/equipment, but if they planned on the thing exploding, can't criticize. Yet.

It's not that they WANTED it to explode. It's that SpaceX's way of doing things often means things will blow up along the way.

NASA (and some others) spend years and years and years working everything out on paper and only build when it's ready to roll. They perfect every little thing (in theory), which does work (usually) but tends to be very expensive and time-consuming.

SpaceX believes that they can move a lot faster if they put together a minimum viable product, launch it, and see what happens. They build stuff cheaply, put sensors all over the place, and use what they learn each time to figure out what needs to be fixed. It's messy and destructive, but they tend to end up with VERY solid results at a much lower cost and timeline (or at least that's what happened with the Falcon 9).

Would they have loved to reach orbit today? Absolutely. Is it possible that there's a design flaw, and Starship will never be successful? Doubtful based on SpaceX's track record, but it's possible. But was today a failure? Nah. No matter what happened, this launch was ending with the rocket either blown up in the air or scuttled at sea. The only thing that really failed was they didn't get as much data from the second stage as they would have liked.

Musk said that anything better than blowing up on the pad would be a success. He may have even meant it.

Don't forget that SH had never flown at all until today, let alone with Starship attached to the top of it.

I read that the plan was not to reach orbital velocity today. Not sure why not. Still planned on Starship "landing" NW of Hawaii so that's still moving at quite a clip.

To give you the idea, NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) has been under development since 2011, has cost $24 billion dollars on development, and launched successfully in November of 2022 with an estimated ongoing cost of $2 billion per launch.

SpaceX has spent an estimated $3 billion on development over about 5 years so far, and they hope to get the per-launch costs down into the single-digit millions (though that's admittedly a lofty goal).

It looked like a good launch until it started doing the pirouettes and losing altitude; If they never planned on recovering the equipment, then it looked like a good launch right up to 1st stage sep (which obviously didn't occur).

I expected it to blow up at Max Q, honestly. And fact that it didn't break apart during those unanticipated flips is amazing. I can't even begin to imagine the stress that put both vehicles under.

I actually thought it would explode as it was doing its first 'spin.' Not sure how it survived that, or the second one. They aren't designed to survive that type of centripetal stress.

Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly is an OUTSTANDING phrase. LMAO

From two years ago:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Aspiring to have no flame diverter in Boca, but this could turn out to be a mistake</p>&mdash; Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1313952039869788173?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 7, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Narrator: It was.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Wild Rover 2 war zone footage with audio. Good stuff! <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SpaceX?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SpaceX</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Starbase?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Starbase</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Starship?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Starship</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Superheavy?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Superheavy</a> <a href="https://t.co/Y8loOualXR">pic.twitter.com/Y8loOualXR</a></p>&mdash; LabPadre (@LabPadre) <a href="https://twitter.com/LabPadre/status/1649068688853671940?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>