Spaceship 2 Mishap

WBI Flyer said:
I have no idea, but news reports seem to indicate that it was not; however, it has also been reported that the two craft separate at 50,000ft, and the incident initiated about 2 minutes after separation at 45,000ft. ??

RIP to the lost pilot and condolences to his loved ones.
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That would read to me to mean "They separated at 50,000', and two minutes later at an altitude of 45,000', SS2 had a catastrophic failure. White Knight must have video of it as well I would think, no?
 
Capt.Crash'n'Burn said:
Hopefully they use the same rocket engine when Bieber goes up. :D
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Now, that wasn't very nice Capt..

I think you should apologize to Mr. Bieber. He has always said nice things about you.

If you don't he will not invite you to his sandbox anymore.:D
 
Henning said:
That would read to me to mean "They separated at 50,000', and two minutes later at an altitude of 45,000', SS2 had a catastrophic failure. White Knight must have video of it as well I would think, no?
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One would think; however, still images of the breakup shown by media do not have White Knight in the frame. ??

-I'm just sick for the families. "The future is built on many hard days like these..." etc, etc. blah blah blah. sure, but it sucks, and it feels different when it is a commercial enterprise in lieu of a governmental one. - I don't know if it should, but it does.
 
All of the videos I've seen, the mother ship drops her like a bomb, and she falls a long way before the engine ignites. It would take done down elevator to keep speed up, and then there's the whole issue do keeping rocket exhaust away from the bigger launch vehicle.

Sad news. I'll be interested to see what they find. Best wishes for the pilot!
 
WBI Flyer said:
...it has also been reported that the two craft separate at 50,000ft, and the incident initiated about 2 minutes after separation at 45,000ft.
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...aaaand what it the primary source of that data? I mean who *told* the secondary source you heard or read it from? When you find out, figure for yourself how accurate those numbers might be.

Nauga,
and his uncertainty quantification
 
WBI Flyer said:
One would think; however, still images of the breakup shown by media do not have White Knight in the frame. ??

-I'm just sick for the families. "The future is built on many hard days like these..." etc, etc. blah blah blah. sure, but it sucks, and it feels different when it is a commercial enterprise in lieu of a governmental one. - I don't know if it should, but it does.
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I would imagine after 2 minutes of separation that the two vehicles would not be in frame together on the lenses used to do this type of telemetry.
 
Henning said:
I would imagine after 2 minutes of separation that the two vehicles would not be in frame together on the lenses used to do this type of telemetry.
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Telemetry? TELEMETRY? You don't have access to telemetry, you haver access to a photographer's raw work product. You're thinking of photogrammetry, but you don't have access to anything suitable for that either with the tools you have at hand.

Nauga,
who is not winging it
 
nauga said:
Telemetry? TELEMETRY? You don't have access to telemetry, you haver access to a photographer's raw work product. You're thinking of photogrammetry, but you don't have access to anything suitable for that either with the tools you have at hand.

Nauga,
who is not winging it
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Ok, photogrammetry. I have a working knowledge of the field of view provided by the optics available for, and typically in use, in such capacities, the field of view is quite limited.
 
hmmm... what a fine line between informing and merely shouting at someone.

Life. Is. Too. Short. - glad to learn new stuff, though.
 
nauga said:
...aaaand what it the primary source of that data? I mean who *told* the secondary source you heard or read it from? When you find out, figure for yourself how accurate those numbers might be.

Nauga,
and his uncertainty quantification
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- media reports. one old, one new, and I'm too lazy to quote it. You may be making the point that those numbers may or may not have anything to do with the incident flight. I'm pretty sure we are all aware of that. If you want to challenge that data, I support you in that. If you find something different than I did, I will be glad to be corrected.
 
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nauga said:
Telemetry? TELEMETRY? You don't have access to telemetry, you haver access to a photographer's raw work product. You're thinking of photogrammetry, but you don't have access to anything suitable for that either with the tools you have at hand.

Nauga,
who is not winging it
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Which reminds me that I saw a documentary once that Scaled built an impressive set of *nix tools for telemetry... and they had a couple of brilliant Linux guys. Looked like fun and demanding work under Rutan.
 
denverpilot said:
Which reminds me that I saw a documentary once that Scaled built an impressive set of *nix tools for telemetry... and they had a couple of brilliant Linux guys. Looked like fun and demanding work under Rutan.
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I work with SCADA systems and am comfortable saying that no magic *nix tools would be required if they wanted to go with industry standard PLCs and radios. The PLCs have real time OS and can spit out data at high rates. The radios can easily handle 200 Mb/s so can pass just a bit of data. Stack a few radios and away ya go....
 
I used to work in photogrammetry and there's no way to analyze anything from the pictures posted. There are no reference points at all or any knowledge of the focal length of the camera.
 
Interesting article about concerns about the Spaceship Two engine:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/1...ing-signs-ahead-of-deadly-spaceshiptwo-crash/

"The Sunday Telegraph has seen emails and other documents in the public domain — dating back several years, and as recently as last year — in which the engineers warned of the dangers of Virgin Galactic’s rocket engine system.

"It also emerged that three senior Virgin Galactic executives — the vice-president in charge of propulsion, the vice-president in charge of safety, and the chief aerodynamics engineer — had all quit the company in recent months."


Ron Wanttaja
 
wanttaja said:
Interesting article about concerns about the Spaceship Two engine:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/1...ing-signs-ahead-of-deadly-spaceshiptwo-crash/

"The Sunday Telegraph has seen emails and other documents in the public domain — dating back several years, and as recently as last year — in which the engineers warned of the dangers of Virgin Galactic’s rocket engine system.

"It also emerged that three senior Virgin Galactic executives — the vice-president in charge of propulsion, the vice-president in charge of safety, and the chief aerodynamics engineer — had all quit the company in recent months."


Ron Wanttaja
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That could be the nail in the coffin for the Spaceship 2 program..:rolleyes:
 
That was a rather interesting read. I wonder what was behind the leadership shake up. Was it a purge or revolt?
 
Henning said:
That was a rather interesting read. I wonder what was behind the leadership shake up. Was it a purge or revolt?
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Awfully wide net for a purge. One could see firing the VP for Propulsion if rocket development was moving too slow or it wasn't safe. One could even see firing the VP for Safety if the VP failed to ensure that critical safety concerns were brought up to upper management to allow them to adjust their planning.

If so, though, it's odd that flight testing with the rocket would be proceeding.

It's probably more likely they quit when their own safety concerns weren't being addressed. The departure of the Chief Aerodynamicist makes this even more likely.

It'll be interesting to see whether Branson waives their Non-Disclosure Agreements for them to speak to the NTSB investigators.

Ron Wanttaja
 
wanttaja said:
Awfully wide net for a purge. One could see firing the VP for Propulsion if rocket development was moving too slow or it wasn't safe. One could even see firing the VP for Safety if the VP failed to ensure that critical safety concerns were brought up to upper management to allow them to adjust their planning.

If so, though, it's odd that flight testing with the rocket would be proceeding.

It's probably more likely they quit when their own safety concerns weren't being addressed. The departure of the Chief Aerodynamicist makes this even more likely.

It'll be interesting to see whether Branson waives their Non-Disclosure Agreements for them to speak to the NTSB investigators.

Ron Wanttaja
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Ahh, you have never heard of Stalin, the master of the purge. "My Chiefs are telling me things I don't want to hear, get me new Chiefs!"
 
Henning said:
Ahh, you have never heard of Stalin, the master of the purge. "My Chiefs are telling me things I don't want to hear, get me new Chiefs!"
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Didja ever notice you never see Richard Branson and Stalin in a room at the same time....?

Ron "Where's Ringo" Wanttaja
 
Well, so much for the new fuel debate...


The rocket engine on the Virgin Galactic Ltd. spacecraft that broke apart on a test flight landed intact without obvious signs of damage, according to a preliminary assessment by U.S. investigators.

The rocket showed no signs that the nitrous-oxide-based fuel had burned through, Christopher Hart, acting chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said in an interview today.

The information suggests that the breakup of SpaceShipTwo was due to something other than an engine explosion.
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http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/20...cket-motor-landed-intact-ntsb-chief-says.html
 
How old is the airframe? When were the structural lay ups done?
 
ElPaso Pilot said:
Well, so much for the new fuel debate...

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/20...cket-motor-landed-intact-ntsb-chief-says.html
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May not be due to the new polymer fuel, but the continued use of Nitrous Oxide might be an issue. Here's an article on the 2007 test stand explosion:

http://www.knightsarrow.com/rockets/scaled-composites-accident/

The Nitrous Oxide system apparently suffered a pressure spike that caused the explosion. This might have happened in the motor, but it could have happened elsewhere in the system.

Sounds like much of the problem was probably due to the ground storage of the N2O; SS2's flight should have been sufficient to get it cooled down and minimize the potential for the pressure spike.

Interesting to note that, in 2007, there were 17 people on-site for the ill-fated test. Five of them retired to an earthen bunker 400 feet away, but "...The remaining eleven people gathered at a chain-link fence in quite close proximity to the testing rig, to watch the experiment."

Simply incredible.

Ron Wanttaja
 
Curious development...
NTSB Cites Improper Pilot Command in Virgin Galactic Disaster
https://www.google.com/search?q=NTSB+Cites+Improper+Pilot+Command+in+Virgin+Galactic+Disaster&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:eek:fficial&client=firefox-a&channel=sb
MOJAVE, Calif.—An improper co-pilot command preceded Friday’s in-flight breakup of Virgin Galactic LLC’s rocket, according to investigators, when movable tail surfaces deployed prematurely.
Two seconds after the surfaces moved—with SpaceShip Two traveling faster than the speed of sound—“we saw disintegration” of the 60-foot-long experimental craft, according to Christopher Hart, acting chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board.
 
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At least it was not the engine that emotional reporter on CNN kept on about
 
Mutts said:
Curious development...
NTSB Cites Improper Pilot Command in Virgin Galactic Disaster
https://www.google.com/search?q=NTSB+Cites+Improper+Pilot+Command+in+Virgin+Galactic+Disaster&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:eek:fficial&client=firefox-a&channel=sb
MOJAVE, Calif.—An improper co-pilot command preceded Friday’s in-flight breakup of Virgin Galactic LLC’s rocket, according to investigators, when movable tail surfaces deployed prematurely.
Two seconds after the surfaces moved—with SpaceShip Two traveling faster than the speed of sound—“we saw disintegration” of the 60-foot-long experimental craft, according to Christopher Hart, acting chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board.
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Requires a subscription but yeah, I read the NTSB. So it looks like an airframe issue, not an engine explosion. Will this be a 'pilot error' incident? Looking that way.
 
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I don't have much to say about this tragedy except that I don't believe any organization in the world has put people into space with their own technology that hasn't been accompanied by people dying along the way. Just the nature of the beast.:(
 
3393RP said:
Those are journalists? I lost count of how many times they all said "basically" and "you know" during their reporting. A few "I mean" were thrown in too.

:rolleyes2:
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I wonder if she had full access to the team during the XPrize days with SS1 but when Virgin came onboard, access to the project was greatly limited, if not cut off totally, when she beats on VG - prompting tweats like this that made headlines...."Joel Glenn Brenner- Former Wash Post on CNN says #SpaceShipTwo testing took friend's life. Says "engine never would work".

Or "Joel Glenn Brenner, former WaPo reporter, near tears, accuses Virgin of fabricating details of engine which "stole" her "friend's life""



Plus she is trying to generate interest in the book shes writting on SS1
 
3393RP said:
Those are journalists? I lost count of how many times they all said "basically" and "you know" during their reporting. A few "I mean" were thrown in too.

:rolleyes2:
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And the gaming community thought they had problems with journalist ethics with "gamergate". :rolleyes2:
 
wanttaja said:
Interesting to note that, in 2007, there were 17 people on-site for the ill-fated test. Five of them retired to an earthen bunker 400 feet away, but "...The remaining eleven people gathered at a chain-link fence in quite close proximity to the testing rig, to watch the experiment."
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Ron, 17-5=12. Which number is wrong?
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Ron, 17-5=12. Which number is wrong?
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Nothing at all, it was just that "1 went to the engine stand to jump the starter relay" was left out of the quote...


(it's a joke, a very bad joke, I say)

Maybe now they'll rethink their system design to include some automation.
 
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